Voicelessness and Emotional Survival > Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board
Mothering Again, con't.
sea storm:
That's ok Hops. Seems time isn't linear anyway. Just goes in loops and spirals sometimes.
Heaven only knows why you posted that but it helped me so much. Clarifying my thoughts on what to do when the sun stops shining and the bottom falls out of my sister's world or mine. They are closely linked. Her bottom falls out and down I go. So that needs to stop.
stones stones stone . Oh Hoppy. You are just not a stone. Stones are inanimate and deader than dead. IF that is what you need to be to survive your daughter cutting you off I understand.
A few years ago due to a collision of the planets or some other unforseen event and her wedding that brought together people who had banished each other my daughter banished me. It was like nothing I have ever experienced pain wise. It was like being killed off and there was no inner or outer resource to cope. It was so big. The mother daughter bond is so powerful and I know you know. You would pilot a helicopter to bail her out of trouble, carry a three hundred pound pallet of bricks 500 miles, brazen yourself to any who would harm her. You raised her in difficult circumstances and actually deserved a reward.
That bond is not to be broken. But it has been broken. Sharper than a serpent's tongue.
If you had not included the background your poem would not have been as accessible.
I am busy chipping away at your stone. I will gently break it up. Daily give it nudges and little knocks. I see your stone not as you but as your refuge. This stone is ok for now though. What a good idea.
Stones break up and can be transformed. I hope you can go there. To see the stone evolve and transform into smaller and smaller pieces until it becomes clay that can be put in a crucible and made into a tea cup for sharing tea.
words are just a part of it all and I can't find the right ones. Just know that I know the pain of being rejected by your child. For me it nearly killed me. Literally, after the final blow I ended up in the hospital with pancreatitis and nearly died.
It felt like I had been poisoned.
So kindest hugs and warm wishes for you.
Loads of love,
Sea
Hopalong:
My gosh. Sea, you get it. I didn't know you had this happen too.
I did think I might die of the heartbreak.
I know it aged and hurt and flattened me.
Not only my only child, but she is my only family.
I don't know that she'll ever be back, or be fully well.
There's so much co-morbidity, as the shrinks say.
She has bipolar depression + mild Asperger's + ADD +
massive complicated grief. Starting with her father, all
the way to cats (grandparents, stepparent, a friend, etc.)--
all that death, plus the dissolution of the rest of her family
as my Nbrother attacked me and my Nmother (who did love
my D) betrayed me in her will...all of it. It was too much for
her psyche and she became someone very very dark and
rageful.
Until she forgives: herself, life itself, her father...and hopefully
one day me...I don't know how she can be whole.
It's all I hope for, that she'll find her own wholeness one day.
Years ago, she was funny, quirky, and though emotionally a
bit stiff, had very kind impulses (always befriended the "loner"
or "ugly" kids--had a huge heart for the underdog).
I love her still. I hold those memories close. I LOVED raising
her (well, engulfing her, since we were too enmeshed and
that's the model I had) ... and her core distinct nature.
It's just that adulthood was too much for her. She began
lying, posing, pretending, spinning...until she spun all the
way out of control. She is a very long way from being able to
be authentic, just herself, and not keep grandstanding on the
internet (punctuated with heartrending pleas for help--and
money--from strangers). But she rejected my last text and letter
in which I offered to pay (a big sum) for her urgent dental work.
I offer love and help and support AND respect for her space
and boundaries. But she's built a fiction, and at one point, was
almost suggesting that both her parents were dead.
For now, I'm dead to her. And you're right, it pulled the plug
out of my sense of myself, the meaning of life. I couldn't and
can't understand how the person I loved and cared about most
in this life...could wind up hating me. But I think she really hates
herself worse than anything, and projected it all my way.
I was the surviving one. Nobody else left to take it out on.
Thank you, Sea--for sharing the pain you felt about your own
daughter. I can't tell you how priceless it is to hear from someone
who knows what that particular agony feels like.
Gratefully,
Hops
PS--Are you still banished from her life? I hesitate to pry.
lighter:
I'm so sorry, Hops.
I didn't realize it's been three years.
I'm so sorry.
Lighter
sea storm:
Hi Hops,
You are right. What you have experienced is unbearable. I don't bear it either. I have to put the pain somewhere else so it doesn't consume me or kill me. I continue to try to order it and make sense of it. I can't understand how I could have gone so wrong or been so bad. Finally, I realize that I wasn't so bad. I played a role in a family where relentless gears were way more powerful than me and I bow to the overwhelming unfairness of it. And I know the story isn't over.
Its been seven years. The first three years of banishment came at a very bad time when I was breaking up with narcissistic husband and I blamed myself for that too. LIke you my daughter is my only family besides my sister. We had been really close I thought. A very big wedding revealed a lot of dynamics that I had been unaware of. I was not allowed to speak at the wedding.
It is seven years later and gradually my daughter sees things differently. I learned in therapy that my daughter is trauma bonded with rich alcoholic father and step mother. The only thing I could have done was to go underground and disappear with her. At the time I was told that a child needs her father and that I should honour this. Also I had no money or education.
I just kept loving her and calling and keeping the calls simple and non triggering. This was not possible at first but got better. She did like to hear from me a little at first. Now she is a mother too and that changed things. She has seen me with her child and knows the kind of mom I am. Her little girl loves me and I love her too.
She had severe post partum depression after the birth of her child and went back to hating me. I don't seem to have power over her feelings that is for sure. I wonder if she will plunge down again after the birth of her second child. She does too and is a little scared. Having that sword of damocles hanging over your head isn't good. She can get very depressed and has been bulimic.
I keep watch from a distance and will help if asked.
I hope this helps you, Hops. You were a good mom but sometimes that is not enough and it is out of your control. I sure know it is not in my control either. Peace be with you.
Love,
SEa
Twoapenny:
Hi Hops,
I'd never read this thread before. Although I knew some of the things between you and your daughter, I think I joined the forum some time after it had all come to a head so I'd not read all of this. It was heartbreaking to read. I know how much you love and miss her, and equally know how the various conditions and illnesses you mention - Bi-Polar, ADD Asperger's - along with unresolved grief and so on - can make life, not only much more difficult for people to manage, but also mean they often see and/or experience the world in a different way. The brain is wired differently, I think, so people see and respond in ways that, for others with different 'wiring', appear hard to fathom out.
The things you wrote about reminded me so much of a Carer's forum that I use, particularly the sections for people who care for those with mental health problems and other neurological conditions. It is so much of a rock and a hard place situation - care and/or medication can't be forced unless there's a significant risk of harm and so people are forced to watch the people they love self-destruct. It's a soul destroying experience, as you know. I wish very much I had some words of wisdom or a magic wand to make it all better but sadly I don't. All I can say is that you are truly loved and cherished here (and I'm sure in other places as well) and I will think of your D as I look at the stars tonight and hope that something in her life clicks into place to help get her to a better place, and will be thinking fondly of you, too. I truly wish I could do more, though.
Love,
Tupp
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