A letter to my mother on the anniversary of dad's death.

[rosencrantz]

Three in a row - CG, I'm competing!!  

The thread about forgiveness had come up again a second time, so I decided to look in.

Forgiveness is empathy.
"I think it means...putting yourself in the position of the other person, and wiping away any sort of resentment and antagonism you feel toward them." Jimmy Carter

"Forgiving is an act of mercy toward an offender. We are no longer controlled by angry feelings toward this person."--Robert D. Enright, Forgiveness is a Choice

Is that what I'm trying to do here?  Is this what the motivation behind the letter is all about?  Is that what the tightrope is all about.  Trying not to fall into the victim, persecutor, rescuer role.  Trying not to fall off either side  into anger or anguish.  Trying to leave no buttons exposed!!!

In that case, I'm not doing very well, am I.  A moment's inattention and RAGE erupts.  I'm ANGRY at them BOTH.  But perhaps you can't forgive UNTIL you've done the anger.  It wasn't 'how do I rationalise what I've done' when dad was dying (by saying 'I honoured my parents by getting out from under', trying to justify and make sure she didn't get to make the most out of my guilt and shame) but how do I get past HER rage and MY rage in order to get THROUGH this terrible time in our lives?????

I have no idea.  It can be 'both..and' but the latter seems more 'clean'.

(Didn't I quote : We're going on a bear hunt...oh no, we've got to go through it)

Come to think about it, I don't remember 'feelings' or 'emotion' every coming up as a topic of conversation in my parents' house!!!  Do they?  Should they??  In normal homes?? Is this relevant???

One day I realised that my son was 'creating' feelings in ME!  I said out loud what I was feeling, then said - I wonder if that's what HE's feeling.  So then, rather than wondering how HE felt, I started asking (even tho it seemed illogical) what he wanted ME to feel.  He seemed irritated, then puzzled, then stopped and thought.  And SAID what it was.  (He wanted me to feel what HE felt!)  And then it all made sense.  And things got better.  Maybe I forget to do that often enough when he's being 'difficult'.

But see how my mother invades me by doing the same thing.  It's OK for a child to do it to a parent but not the other way round.  It's too overwhelming for a child to handle being invaded in that way.  Child to parent is appropriate; parent to child is 'invading'.  That's my 'opinion'.  I don't understand enough about this.  I'm stuck.  But a huge part of me is terrified of my mother because I don't know who's who and whether my feelings are mine or hers.  Why am I looking at this right now?  How does it fit in with being angry?????

Well, I've stopped crying at least.  Is everybody all right out there??????
R

[Anonymous]

Hi Rosencrantz,

I just wanted to say Hi again, and make a few coments,

I do have a small voice of my own questioning the 'reality' of the work I'm doing here.  What will happen in the big bad world?  It's all very well 'working' here but what's the reality?  Instant collapse again???

For me personally, I find the sounding boards here are so varied, that taken on the whole it's extremely balanced. Much better advice and comments and feedback than I get talking to myself all day      

But I think what I'm doing is coming to terms with my own feelings (and thoughts?) before she can 'get' to them

This reminds me a bit of the thing I thought about the time, effort and consideration required on your part to buy the gift with the least 'problems'. This would be so draining for me, having to go to these lengths just to relate to someone. I don't think I could handle any relationship that stayed like this long term. Something would give because it creates just too much stress on one side.

I know that she wanted to control every last bit of me and her environment when I was little and so it became a problem as I grew older.  She still does have that need and she creates confusion and chaos IN ORDER to control her environment.  Perhaps, it's like a baby flailing around in a panic trying not to drown.  Again, it might be her reaction to loss or exacerbated by loss.  

However, I'm taking it (at this moment in time) that she's not 'normal' like you and me.  She's floundering because she's chosen to be totally dependent on one other person.  And she's done that as a punishment to the rest of the world for not appreciating her and not respecting her enough.  But she caused most of that in the first place.

And that's because her tragic flaw is paranoia (is there a better word?) - It's believing that the world is out to 'get' her and 'do her down'.  Everyone she can't control is trying to harm her.  And sh*t - really big SH*T here - that's where my H comes from, too.

You know what I see here in your mum Rosencrantz, not so much a paranoid, although I'm sure that's where it's led or become, but I see a complete 100% perfectionist. A perfectionist who never met or achieved her own impossible, unrealistic, unattainable, inhuman high perfectionist standards.

And that's why she superimposed them onto you. That's why she wanted to control you, believing that by her influence and control, you could/would achieve what she hadn't. She thought she knew where she'd failed in her own life and thought she could achieve this high standard through you. Maybe she even blamed your dad for herself not achieving it, and hence she stood between you and him, so that he couldn't get in the way of you achieving it. And some of the things I've read about perfectionists is that they are usually terribly harsh critics and procrastinate all the time too.

How am I doin'? I'll stop on that one for now, cause if I'm way off base, no point me continuing. And if I'm saying what you already know, then not need me continuing. And if it's a new slant worthy of your consideration because it provides some light then your brain is better than mine on this stuff anyway. But that's one of the thoughts I had. We can keep going on this one if you want to. I'll wait for you to come back

She discovered that I'd sent a letter of complaint (absolutely justified, and fulsome apology received) to the social services for something they did outrageously wrong so I'm 'the good guy' there, too!  So I've agreed and seen that something was bad that she didn't manipulate me or anyone else about.  That's a step forward, too.  She doesn't phone me and hassle me.  That's a huge plus.  She took back a suicide threat.  That's great, too!   She seems genuinely to want to understand 'why' things happened 'back then'.  And I seem to be getting strong enough to be able to tell her.  Maybe she's getting strong enough to understand, too. Who knows

.
There is some good stuff in here, I'm glad there are some positive signs.

Hmm - well, she may never be able to stop 'controlling' and forcing her OWN solutions on me.   But maybe I can be distant enough to laugh rather than fight.  You know : do a bit of       right at her.  

How about 'trying' to control and force    I like the laughter bit, it can relieve a lot of tension. I'm trying to think of what you would have on a T-Shirt if it was the only thing you could ever say to or about your mother and you thought she'd be able to laugh and not take offence!!!! How about,
They call me stupid, wanna know why
My mum F**KED  up her life and I've
given her mine to F**K up too.

Or
What's the definition of stupid,
Letting someone who's f**ked up there life ruin yours as well.

I'm just playing here Rosencrantz, I try not take to take myself too seriously, I'd love to make a T-shirt like that

I do know my mother's in a lot of emotional pain. She's never been on a cruise.  Doesn't drive.  Never had an affair.  Doesn't drink.  Is diabetic, had heart failure two years ago, has had laser surgery for cataracts and can't see very well, has had electric shock treatment for 'depression' in the past, and lives in about a square foot of space surrounded by mountains of paper and things and photographs of me.  She's too ashamed to let anyone in (house/soul) - and anyway, people can't get in to help (house/soul).  There are no small luxuries in her life and little human contact.  It's painfully, painfully sad.        And I don't want her to live like that.  But I know it's a choice and it's her choice.  Sortof!

This last part is the sad reality of her choices and where they have led her, and it's not to be denied. I think you connect so much with her pain because she's made you painfully aware of herself since you were born.

I have the image that you could move to another galaxy and still be in fine-tune with her. That would be okay I suppose if she was well and good for you and a healthy-minded giving freeing loving individual. But I figure that at the moment she has such a hold over you that you could not see her for 6 months and you'd think about her nearly everyday. even when you don't want to.

I see it a bit like that movie Dragonheart, where the good dragon DRAGO and the bad prince shared the same heart and felt each other's pain. Only the difference here with you and your mum is it's one sided and it seems to me like you're feeling all her pain as well as your own. That's terribly suffocating, confusing, help-me-I'm-drowning, stuff. Imagine the confusion of having a perfectly nice time. But you're in tune with some-one else's pain and you don't know it. All of the sudden you get pangs of their pain or anxiety, and yet you know there's nothing wrong with you!!!
How freaky and confusing would that be.

I think the answer, it seems to me, is all mixed up with you detaching, and or learning how to detach somehow. You moved out, but somehow the psychological fasteners and bonds have remained as strong as ever. You crave and desire to stand strong and independant. You have to learn to disengage. I just looked up the dictionary at detach and detachment. It's worth doing. It gave another type of good context example for detach, "troops sent on a separate mission". How cool. You're on a separate mission to your mum. What is it? Get the journal out and work on it. She's nearly completed hers, sadly. But you aren't anywhere near completing yours, you're still well into it. And yours and hers, they 'ARE' completely, totally, separate, unconnected missions. this is different to cutting off. I'm talking about an emotional detachment here, but I guess I figured you knew that.

You said somewhere something like you don't so much feel concern for her but you feel her pain. ( I may be slightly misquoting you, I tried to find it) That is such a powerful image you express. I feel the key to your freedom in this realtionship lies in that part of it, somewhere. Bringing to an end this part of your relationship where you feel her pain. What do you think? And I wonder so much about Wildflower's points, like you're the child who'd lost her father, why isn't it her ringing and comforting you?

I hope I haven't made anything worse with writing this. I felt so checked by what Portia said about people who prod and poke to see others pain. I'm trying so hard not to do that here, but I don't know if I still am. I hope not. And I'm a bit chicken to butt in here on this one, cause you're both so great, but I thought I could see how Portia ducked out for a while cause she was concerned about saying something to you Rosencrantz that might cause you more pain now at this fragile time in your life. What a true friend

((((BIG HUG))))

CG

[Portia]

Hiya R.
Can I forget previous pages for now? I want to play questioner today. Looks like you want answers, a conversation, so maybe we can talk about you. Just you. I want to try and understand, which means I want to be invisible, definitely not noticed. Here we go, straight to the point, this is no time for messing about, being polite, this is me going in like a surgeon:

Is this what the motivation behind the letter is all about?

What was/were your motivation(s)? Forget everything you’ve ever read – look inside yourself for the answer. I really want you to look hard because this could be a great big whopping key for you. Read your posts in this thread. But don’t tell us unless you want to.

But perhaps you can't forgive UNTIL you've done the anger.

Exactly. No doubt about it.

how do I get past HER rage and MY rage

There is no other way than separating.

I don't remember 'feelings' or 'emotion' every coming up as a topic of conversation in my parents' house!!! Do they? Should they?? In normal homes??

They do in normal homes, I’ve witnessed it in other people’s homes (my current step-mother is an expert, loving mother and her sons have no problem with talking about their emotions).

One day I realised that my son was 'creating' feelings in ME! I said out loud what I was feeling, then said - I wonder if that's what HE's feeling. So then, rather than wondering how HE felt, I started asking (even tho it seemed illogical) what he wanted ME to feel. He seemed irritated, then puzzled, then stopped and thought. And SAID what it was. (He wanted me to feel what HE felt!) And then it all made sense. And things got better. Maybe I forget to do that often enough when he's being 'difficult'.

I’m not sure I understand what’s happening above. It sounds like you were empathising with him and not realising it? Otherwise what was it? Might be an interesting area, worthy of more talking.

my mother invades me by doing the same thing

You choose to empathise with her brain. You allow the ‘invasion’. She cannot physically get inside your head – thank God. And empathy is not an absolute truth of exactly what another person is experiencing: you can never ‘know’ exactly what anyone else experiences. Okay, I’m breaking my first line and going to quote from page 2 where Wildflower said this fantastic thing:

Wildflower said: Tell her the truth. You've been grieving. You miss your dad terribly. You wanted to be able to give your mother support, but you were too upset yourself. It's your right.

See, it’s all about how YOU feel, not about her. Exactly. I was applauding WF at this point.

Wildflower said: Or better yet, you decide whether or not she deserves to know how you feel. Just know on the inside that you don't have to justify yourself in this time. You're hurting just as much as she is. If not more.

Ah – “IF NOT MORE”. That deserves capitals. You do not know how your mother feels, however much you think you do. Did your mother ‘love’ your father? What does she mean by ‘love’? (Ask any ACON or PartnerON here what an N means by ‘love’ and you know the reply – Ns don’t have a clue, cannot have a clue.)

But a huge part of me is terrified of my mother because I don't know who's who and whether my feelings are mine or hers.

Your feelings are yours, but some are caused by her smothering. But they belong to you. And you can change them! But understanding this (as I know you do?) is not feeling it, embracing it and letting it change your view.

Why am I looking at this right now? How does it fit in with being angry?????

Because this lady who appears to be so needy, so sad and who appears to depend upon you utterly – is ruining your life. And you have every right to be angry about that, angry with her. And especially angry with yourself, for ‘allowing’ it to happen.
What did that external person say? “Your mother is trying to hurt you.” I wonder why she is. It doesn’t matter though, the reason, because I’m only interested in your life, not your mother’s. It is enough that she tries to hurt you – her motivation is her problem and she’s not here to talk to.

So - why do you try to empathise – so deeply - with your mother’s feelings at this sad time? Why not instead concentrate on your own? If your mother wants to talk to you, I’m sure she will. As Wildflower said, “You're hurting just as much as she is. If not more.”. Precisely. You are a separate person. You have to separate. Even if she doesn’t want you to. Even if you don’t want to.

You are a wonderful human being. With love and best intentions, your friend, P

[Anonymous]

Hey Portia I mussta' just beat ya' by 1 second

CG

[Portia]

CG, I don’t know what synchronicity happened for us to post at the same MINUTE there (yep, you got me by seconds), but I’m glad it did. Hey, I gotta say:

I felt so checked by what Portia said about people who prod and poke to see others pain. I'm trying so hard not to do that here

No way CG, you are not an N! ....come up to you real close and peer at you, looking for emotion with a kind of fascination. I can see N therapists might be in their own personal heaven, the bastards.

Thanks for your kind words CG about me ‘ducking out’ too. I had to take time off the board to think about your letter and posts R. You got me stumped and I had to work it through.

[Wildflower]

Hi Rosencrantz,

I see Portia and CG have posted, and I don't have time to read their posts so this may be repetitive (but maybe we need all the reinforcement we can get).

That's what's so hard for me to find/define. The truth. I know that's the truth and I know those are the choices I have. But it takes SO MUCH WORK for me to 'analyse the situation' and get there. Thanks for the script!!!!!!!

This reminded me of how I felt for a while with Dad.  Under so much pressure to DEFINE MYSELF because if I didn't, he most certainly would.  Faster than I could blink.  It was before I knew about NPD, so I just had these vague ideas that I was being violated.  I knew something was wrong, but not what.  He would run over me in conversation (hah, conversation), and I would kind of grunt and try to push him back.  More a gut feeling than anything.  I couldn't find words.

But he saw me trying to push him away and it made him LIVID.  He had tantrums and DEMANDED that I explain myself.  WhenI tried to say, I don't know, I'm trying to figure that out, he responded in a desperate rage by "advising" me that I couldn't know what I was thinking until I found the words to describe it (read: the words to give him so he could dismantle my thinking, argue it down).  Well, he's right in a way.  I have the words now and I'm much stronger and more in touch with my feeings.  But no amount of pressure could change the way I felt, and I deserved the time to figure out how I felt without someone yelling at me.

You deserve that time, too.  So it's okay to say, hmmm, I think this is how I feel so I want to try to respond to what little bits of truth I'm holding onto so far.  You do NOT have to have all the answers right now, though I can understand how your mother might pressure you to feel that way.

And by the way, it's so much easier to say this to someone else - I'm not attached to your mother so no cloudy thoughts there.  My mother, though?     Hopeless I am.

Take care (of yourself),
Wildflower

[Portia]

Wildflower, good advice towards the end there.

R, to add to WF's post: you don't have to post back quickly either. No pressure. I won't go away, I won't take it personally if you don't post for a month (tho' I might worry about you). So don't think you have to talk to us, answer us, whatever. Because this thread isn't about us - it's about you. And that's ok. Maybe you can take some time to think inside, without the pressure to 'solve' it.

Sometimes the best answers come when we least expect them (like when I'm washing up!) - give the brain a break...let it run free and lazily and it does incredible things all on it's own, like dreaming.

Give yourself a break gal if you want to, you deserve it ("because you're worth it!") P

[rosencrantz]

Picture : I just keep marching along, dragging my ball and chain with me.  The ball and chain just turned into my mother hanging on for dear life and I'm just trying to ignore her.  Anybody got a hacksaw (except I'm afraid I'll lose a leg    in the process of prising her away - or I might hurt her even more than she's hurt herself already).

As my mother hasn't let go the past, neither have I!  She didn't let go of me and I didn't let go of the shock!!!

It was a shock - to have your own mother DESPERATE for you.  Desperate for you like a lover might be.  It's creepy.  Wanting you over and above your father.  What can you do with that?  Sorry, mum - if I had more than one life, I'd dedicate one of them to you but I've only got one and I've got work to do.  Guilt, shame.

I just can't remember what I felt.  I know I limped!!!  (Now I know why!!)  Guiltily I have feared I must have been an N!  I didn't care, did I?  I didn't 'see' her anyway.  I really was indifferent.  She was being a pain.  I'm sure I used to do this a lot    If I talked about her, it would be in a disparaging way.  Oh, 'her'!  Shake of the head.  

But I think it just got worse over the years.  Her pain got worse, her blame got worse.  She didn't recover.  She didn't 'get over it'.  She didn't 'make a life'.  She drowned.

Or did she?  What I'm discovering is that she roped in all my cousins - or the ones she could manipulate.  Do this, do that.  Run this errand.  Get me that.  (Oh, gosh - N Queen again)  She gave up on me, she gave up on the world and decided to become Miss Haversham - totally, totally dependent instead.  

I wasn't interested in her AT ALL  (well can you blame me? I'll take it as read : of course not!)  Until, after 20 years she started to say 'well, if only you'd say you love me/us' and it would stick in my throat.  Thoughts : "Honestly?  No, I don't love you.  I almost despise you.  But I've been indifferent for so long and had to get along on my own for so long, I don't even know who you are."  Even that was probably more painful to her than if I'd hated her.

I can't remember a time of 'love'.  I really have no idea what that means.  Comfort, warmth in exchange for being a 'good girl'.  She knelt at the side of my bed and listened to me when I whimpered about how everyone at school hated me.  Oh, she loved that.  In fact, they didn't!  They all put together to buy me an LP - my first!!! I put onto them the negative stuff I was experiencing at home.  I didn't know how to react to the gift and hid it.  

By the time I was in my late 30s, I was so frightened of her calls that my husband had to hold onto me to keep me from 'flying off the handle', getting my buttons pushed.  Had she no shame?  Trying to control me from a distance.  Putting herself in the firing line.  Getting herself consistently and constantly rejected.

I think when dad was ill, I opened up for the first time to HER, to what she was, to her pain and I was horrified at what I discovered.  And the guilt was crushing.

But I hadn't banked on the manipulation (I didn't know what it was - like I said - I don't KNOW I just FEEL.  Wrong words - there's more than one way of knowing.  Knowing as in knowledge/brain and knowing as in intuition/sensing.  I don't KNOW in either sense!!!!!  I really solely only FEEL.  And then I have to ratchet up the brain cells to try to put meaning to it all.  The community psychiatric nurse gave me the word 'manipulation'.  

So there I am, great gaping wounds, father dying, mother much quieter than I might have expected, much less demanding than she used to be but I know I'm going to have to avoid getting the blame for so much that went wrong at that time.  She got close a couple of times, but I've steered her away (sensibly cos I know I couldn't stand it).  

But time and again in those few days I was with her, she nearly drove me mad.  I don't know how or why but she'd just 'go on and on'!!!  Stop it, I'd plead.  Stop it, I'd shout.  Stop it, I'd rave.   STOPPPPPP IIIIIIIT.  AAAAAAAAGHHHHHHHHHH.  Let my brain alone.... (I guess she wants to take over my brain, so things are done her way???)  "I want this thing done"  "OK" "Now BE ME, I'm in control.  Move 3" to the left, now wave my magic wand and pouf!  Where's what I wanted?  Oh, it's all wrong - why did you do that you horrible, horrible child - you did that on purpose just to get at me."  Or if I ignore her and go ahead to achieve this thing she wants, she'll go on and on at me until it's done.  How to survive???  She has no idea how to achieve some task but wants to control how it's done.

Oh Portia - brain - yes, I know I don't know what's going on in her brain.  Except I used to think that she'd say black was white if it suited her.  And I know you understand what that means.  This is different.  I'm guessing that it may not be in your experience if you've had a 'distant' relationship with a parent.  What I describe is accurate and true.  I found this idea of 'projective identification' in the Nina Brown books - and I recognised it as 'that thing' I think my mother does.  I could be wrong - I've been wrong about so much, why not that, too.  I have had great fear about it - but no more - remember, I believe in me now!  

But I'm wondering when I first thought this.  When did I come up with this idea that I feel other people's feelings???

School's out - gotta go.   CG - Perfection - no that's not my mother - it's me but not her.  I'll be back.
R

[rosencrantz]

They call me stupid, wanna know why
My mum F**KED up her life and I've
given her mine to F**K up too.

Priceless!  Ever thought of setting up your own business. You know like The Shrink is In from the Peanuts cartoons.  Get a life T shirts.  Mantras R Us.  Fortune Cookie T shirts.

You'd make a bomb with your spot-on accuracy and searing wit.  
R

[Portia]

R, fine, yes, I understand projective identification and I’m starting to recognise when it happens to me (it happens to me, not I make it happen). However: you understand the concept, you understand and feel the feeling, but then you stop it. You stop it happening to you. You stop it. People will still send those projected feelings to you – but you learn how to stop them.

It’s like tennis. They serve, you catch the ball and hold onto it.
Instead: they serve, you watch the ball, catch it but then go ‘oww it’s hot’ and drop it.

I recognised it as 'that thing' I think my mother does.

It’s not one way. Someone has to be there to catch the ball. And then they ‘choose’ to hang on to it. You have to find how to make that choice.

I have felt this. And I’ve caught the ball and held it for minutes and then chucked it away. If only I could reach the stage where I don’t even catch that bloody ball. Now that would be progress.

R – you are responsible for your mental health. You are not responsible for your mother’s mental health.

It was a shock - to have your own mother DESPERATE for you. Desperate for you like a lover might be. It's creepy.

Yep, I know. Very yucky. It’s called emotional incest and it’s just as bad as physical incest, except you can never be sure it was really all that bad can you. Where are the scars? Where is the evidence?
RUN AWAY. SEPARATE. Do you want to?

I have to go buy food now. And I should really have a shower.

I will be back too – sometime! P

[Wildflower]

It was a shock - to have your own mother DESPERATE for you. Desperate for you like a lover might be. It's creepy. Wanting you over and above your father. What can you do with that? Sorry, mum - if I had more than one life, I'd dedicate one of them to you but I've only got one and I've got work to do. Guilt, shame.

Just a knee-jerk response here (peeking in instead of working   ).  I stumbled upon a paragraph while reading Secunda last night, and it made me think about you.  I was going to save it for later (you have enough on your plate), but since you brought it up....

It's on the bottom of page 74-ish (left side).  Not sure.  Secunda's talking about triangling, and in this one paragraph, she says that some parents triangle their children in and exploit them by making them fulfill what the marriage isn't fulfilling.  Something like that...wish I had the book with me now.  Made me think about how you leaving home may really have been about her husband leaving her in a weird way.  And the way she reacted (bitched then whined and clung desparately) when your father died and you helped her out.  Just an alternate reading on whether or not it's abandonment that sends her reeling.

Wildflower

[Anonymous]

It was a shock - to have your own mother DESPERATE for you.  Desperate for you like a lover might be.  It's creepy.  Wanting you over and above your father.  What can you do with that?  Sorry, mum - if I had more than one life, I'd dedicate one of them to you but I've only got one and I've got work to do.  Guilt, shame.

Gosh             , It's almost a case of seperating a set of siamese twins Rosencrantz. There you are with 2 heads and bodies, but only one set of lungs and heart. One has to go. The surgeons have to decide???? Which twin has the greatest prospect of survival.????? The greatest prospects fo a future????????

Then another thought hit me. Bang. When you talked about her surprising silence now, since your dad died. How scary and unpredictable. Is she going to eventually going to say it???? Are you waiting for the blame. Will she try to blame you for it? "It's because you cut off, you never contacted us, he'd probably still be here today if..." you know what I'm saying?  

CG

[Anonymous]

Yeah Portia, and have one for me too while you're there. Gosh, I've been off the fags for a month now. Gee I think I could really enoy one about now. But I'll resist the urge to.

Portia, I think you're right about the Emotional Incest thing. Wish I could remember the name of the book I read.????? The thing I remember reading about parent/child E.I is how the child/survivor of E.I finds it nigh impossible in the future to ever experience the type of depth and intimacy in any other type of relationship. Because they took on early responsibility for the parents happiness and needs, and were never free to be 'child', they were always busy 'substitute partnering' the parent, they missed out on normal childhood. They tuned in so deeply and intimately to the parent wants, needs, amd dreams, and sadly at great cost 'tuned out' of their own. The reltionship is telepathic, or telepathetic, and all future relationships seem almost 'lacking in depth' in comparison. Which is actually just a very powerful illusion. What they are really lacking is the 'sickness'.

How are you going Rosencrantz???? Not getting too much for you, is it? Just sing out when you want me to shut-up        

((((HUG))))
CG

[rosencrantz]

I can't stop - I'm hurtling down this helter-skelter.  I'm worried about you all out there but I just can't stop.  Son is happy on his own computer.  H learning to leave me to my tears.  

CG - you're right that paranoia isn't the right word - I'm sure it isn't.  But nothing's ever 'right' in her life.  It's not that SHE isn't right.  The world isn't right.  The social worker says she's having a 'great' time at the Day Centre, 'holding court'.  They said that when she 'flounced' off to hospital, too.  Holding court, slagging off all the nurses, getting everybody else involved in her fantasies of neglect and cruelty.  

Honestly, she's in a fantasy of her childhood.  But maybe how she felt in her childhood was a fantasy, too.  How 'cruel' her sisters were.  Then one of them dies and suddenly she was her best friend.  But no-one is ever good enough.  Her demands are 'outrageous', unrealistic, inappropriate.  But then, the demands she used to put on herself were outrageous, too.  And then she feels so badly unappreciated when the world doesn't stop to admire.

The purpose of the funeral was so that she could be Queen for a day.  We discern by contrast : Her first thought was new shoes, I hadn't even thought about what to wear - what did I care what I wore?  Finally realised I'd better look the part to meet the expectations of others.  

"You should look after your mother - you've only got one mother, you know." What would you know about MY mother. You deal with your own!!!

Oh dear, I've started to 'betray' her.  I let people know by subtle and not to subtle means what she's really like.  Hey, why should I let her slag me off to the world.  I'm fed up with it.  (Originally I felt I didn't want to interfere in her relationships with others - let it be - but this is MY integrity which is being called into account and I can't stand the guilt!!)  They are dumbfounded when they realise they've been misled and perhaps I'm not quite as she's described!!!  I know the sound now over the telephone.  A sort of a small 'oh', a kind of deflation and a silence as it's digested.  Then I know they know!!!

A couple of people suggested my mother's problems are as a result of low self-esteem.  It was certainly difficult to see that behind the spite and the sarcasm and the irrationality she expressed towards me.  (A defence?  Please do bite the hand that feeds you!)  But I see sparks of it - I pat her on the head and she's like a puppy, a beaming child.   "You did well"  but frankly, she didn't and she just screwed things up even more and caused even more havoc.  "For God's sake, let ME do it"  Do I say that?  In action, if not in words.  I'm not patient.  I get too roughed up by her if I am.  Can you see how impossible it all is. We're close to the R/P/V thing again.

Hell's teeth - I'm not even sure she DOES need me.  Father asked me to pay money into the bank to pay the standing orders and I took over from there.  Of course, Dad - you trust me.  You know I'll look after things properly.  And probably she felt a child again with parents, him and me.  I strode in.  I should have tip-toed in.  I assumed she 'needed' me, that things were still as they had been where we left off 20/30 years ago!!!  That ol' 'here I am - car crash' thing again, I suppose.  (And anyway, I'm glad I did - it's one thing she can't manipulate me about although she manipulates everyone else - "poor me, me no understand, me no money, help me, pity prease". Gotcha - SMASH!  It really is mpossible, isn't it.  I'm getting there!!!).  

And anyway, she was the one who went straight back to 30 years ago.    It was because father asked 'what is it about your mother' (over the phone from hospital bed) in front of her and her neighbour and she felt shamed!!  (I only just put that particular 2 and 2 together!)  Dear, dear, dear.  NOT because SHE cared!!!!!   It's only taken me a year to work that one out!!!  Grrrr!

I think she was very lonely when she was little but I don't really have evidence for that.  She felt unwanted.  Always being 'turfed off' somewhere.   Hey, I was due to stay overnight with her mother one time when I was little and I hated it!  Maybe they were pretty horrible.  All of her neighbours are out to get her, too.  I spend time with her and I begin to think so, too!!!  But dad got on with them all OK - they liked him, thought he was a 'nice man'.

Ah - it's too easy to slip back into seeing the world through her eyes.  My H has taught me much kinder ways of relating to self and others.  Or he taught me it's OK to be more relaxed about people.  It's OK to be generous just cos you feel like it!!  It actually does make me feel good to 'give' (not if somebody feels 'obliged' back tho - just genuine 'give and take' not counting who owes who).

What's the title of that book about borderline PD?  I hate you, don't leave me.  That's my mother (or is it me?).  Both...and?  At least I chose a man who wouldn't force me to play that game.  He may have taken me by surprise with something I was blinkered about - but he was a good choice considering all the messups/pain I could have hankered after!!  I used to alternate between the unavailable ones and the ones with 'problems'.  Oh, do I have time enough in this lifetime to get through ALL the different kinds of 'men with problems' that exist, I did once wonder!!!!!  What 'life experience' they gave me.  Give me the sick bag.  Puke!  Whatever problems we may have, I certainly respect my H.

Right - standing back a bit to take an overview.  I know I'm being a headless chicken.  I wonder if this is how Ulysses got written.  LOL  Portia - I just can't look.  Ok, I will.  But I need a break.  Maybe what I've written here is sufficient mea culpa.  I DID separate.  But I can't NOW.  Not since I've seen how much PAIN she's in.  My poor H got used as a therapist this afternoon.  I sobbed and sobbed and shouted all this stuff about wanting someone else to love my mother for me.  It's real enough.

I'm glad you know what that means re the projective identification.  But you must have good boundaries.  I don't know about it happening until LONG after it's in me.  I think that telling me to do it your way is like asking me to have a personality transplant.   I can't SEE the ball, I can only feel it - later.  And anyway I was always told I wasn't feeling what I was feeling so how should I know??!  

Who decided voicelessness was to blame - what about feelinglessness  

Much later...

Wildflower - that script is really giving me a resting place and helping me not fall into the abyss below!!!

You'll all be glad (bloody thankful probably ) to know that I said to my H a few minutes ago 'I'm coming home.  I seem to have been away a long time, but I'm coming home now'.  I guess that bit of channelling means a bit of peace for us all!!!  Thank you!!!!!
R

[rosencrantz]

I've missed some posts - coming back tomorrow - exhausted right now.  I'll be replying!!!!!!!
Thanks for being there.
S/R