Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board
Voicelessness and Emotional Survival => Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board => Topic started by: Hopalong on January 21, 2006, 09:00:16 PM
-
Hi folks,
First, I know everyone would tell me: move out, find another place to live. I can't.
I just need to vent.
My mother starts in on me Friday evenings. It's subtle but constant pressure. She's lonely (her attention has been massively reduced by her age, but it's agony for her because she's so N and has few inner resources, and has been too "special" to associate with ordinary folks who go to the senior center, so her few friends are dying off). I come home exhausted and in pain and the drip-drip starts. Little remarks, guilt trips when I go out for a few hours with a friend. (I should not go out, is the subtext. I should stay home and worshipfully attend her.) I refuse. I go out. Then Saturday I hide in my room all day long. By Saturday night she's again accusing me of being a bad daughter. I explain I'm extremely stressed over work and other things and I really need space to recuperate. As usual, it's water off a duck's back. She ups the ante, tries tears.
I harden myself, resist, quietly discard another guilt-trip note unread. Go back to my room. She calls me on my own phone line. More guilt trip.
I tend to her medical needs, always. I try to be kind.
But I am beyond the point where I can pretend to enjoy her company. I am mostly compassionate and civil but the largest force in my body is to escape her. When I am under the greatest stress and hence most vulnerable, that is always, exactly, when her demands escalate.
It winds up that I am stuffing myself, hiding in my room, gaining weight, not even venturing out for a walk....
and by bedtime I have chest pain and took a tranquilizer.
So I dread weekends. I feel guilty because she is very very old. And it is pitiful.
But I am so FINISHED. Just at the time when one might be caring for an elder with gratitude and tenderness because of all the kind things they've done for one.... instead I experience her like an old rattlesnake that has far, far outlived its natural stretch.
And that feels like an evil though to think. I cannot wait for it to be over.
My daughter perceives her narcissism too and told me on the phone last night, no matter how nice and proper grandma pretends to be, I know that under the skin she's a cruel and hateful person.
Hyperbole because daughter's young...but then again...not.
Whew. Just needed to narrate it and I thank you for listening.
I think I will hug myself. I am having a pity party.
(((((((((((((((((Hopalong))))))))))))))) well. that was...okay. sniff.
-
Hoppy,
Your daughter may be young but she is spot on. If anything, more than your good self.
I think at least part of you realises you do not owe her anything and at least she hasn't got long to torment you, and don't feel bad about that either. You are going above and beyond the call of duty to take care of her. You'll be in heaven with Mother Theresa.
I think you ought to find more ways of escaping. Is your mother mobile? If not, put on headphones when you are in your room. And don't answer the phone at all, if you can't manage to screen her calls.
She is not pitiful She is reaping what she has sowed. The universe is paying her back. Except for the fact that she has you. She doesn't deserve you.
Can you invite friends over? This may sound odd, but it could give you relief from her alone, provide some entertainment for her, and allow others to see what she really is, which might generate some understanding and support amongst your flesh and blood friends. As long as your friend will not supply her, at least not sincerely.
Hoppy, you are a far better person than I! She would mysteriously have fallen down the stairs by now! Just kidding.
Plucky
-
Thanks, Plucky. I mean it.
Unfortunately my friends don't come over...NMom's so draining it's just less hassle to meet them elsewhere. On the rare occasions they do drop by, they do supply her. Their politeness is too ingrained not to (as she's in their face, beaming, virtually demanding it). And I can't blame them...it's not their battle to fight.
Fortunately I do have two girlfriends PLUS this forum to listen to me rant now and then.
And a blessed T who totally gets it. And a wonderful church community.
So I need to count my blessings.
It was very therapeutic to write out that whole thing though.
Today was pretty rough, she out-gamed me. But it's over.
Thanks MUCHO for hearing me, especially with all you're going through. (((((Plucky))))))
That generosity is what blows me away about this place.
And this has become a real place, a healing place, for me.
(((((((((((((Everyone)))))))))))))
Hopalong
-
Hoppy,
I actually thought about and looked into a device that would tune out the frequency of my Mother's voice... When I lived with her.. Does such a device exist? Maybe some child of a narcissist could get rich on this idea, patent it and move out from under the death crush of their N parent!!
:) Hey, there's a fantasy for you. Take your pain and turn it into something useful.
Daydreaming never hurt anyone. I'm a master of it myself. I'm not sad and I don't feel bad for you. Do you know why?? I know you are strong and stronger than her even, and you are the healthy one, so you can ignore her. It's tough, but you've done it before. And maybe headsets are aren't the exotic noise cancelling devices I exactly envision..but they might work too. :?
Oh yeah, and my idea was to pop one of those suckers in before going to my parents, and it would only filter out Their voices, not all my siblings who I like to hear. and unbeknownst to them they would wonder why nothing they said had any effect on me anymore.
:) :x :lol:
-
(((((((((Hoppy))))))))))))
Sweetie.... YOU know YOU'RE not a bad daughter, keep hold of that thought and trust your own judgement.
With your Mum and everything happening it work, you are bound to be so so stressed... anyone would be and as a typical N, your Mum will expect everything you can give from you. We both know this, so setting yourself some healthy boundaries, taking time out to yourself is a normal thing to do.... heck, the only thing you can do.
Maybe one thing you can do is to put one evening aside for her, where you spend time with her. Yes, I can feel your heart sinking at this... I know mine would be with my bio dad, but if you had the same night with her each week... what are we really talking about 6 pm to 10 pm at the latest, four hours.... then when she uses her subtle hints on a Friday/Saturday/Sunday, you can say... Yes Mum, I know how you feel but we agreed that X was your night and that this is my night where I can go out.
You need help Hoppy hon.... it's not a bad thing to say I can't cope at the moment. Can you siblings do more? Where they come and spend a different night with her each week? Or a friend of her's.... that they come over the same night each week?
With the senior centre.... what about showing her in a way that will benefit her? If it's anything like senior centres over here, they have day trips. So maybe a way is, Oh look Mum, would you like a day out here? This company is doing such and such... etc etc.
Basically I'm trying to say, is there anyway you can get help where your Mum thinks it's about her, what will benefit her from her point of view? Rather than Hoppy having to take on everything, and just be there.
((((((((((((((((((((((((((((Huge hugs honey))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))
H&H xx
-
Thanks ((((((((H&H))))))))) you're reading my mind.
NMom just insisted on moving back to the 2nd floor bedroom. I begged her not to. I told her, I know on your good days it'd be fine, but on your weak days it will mean me running up and downstairs to bring you each meal, take down dirty dishes, bring up papers, take down papers, bring you water, bring you other things. She set her jaw and said no. She got her old cleaning lady to come over and move all her stuff up while I was at work. So she's been up here 2 nights and this morning she says, ohhhh I don't feel well...and it's true. So I fixed her breakfast and brought it up on a tray and off we go... (I said, you should be downstairs. She said, I guess you're right.)
She ruined the entire weekend by pouncing on me with trivial demands (every thought in her head is an emergency) from the moment I walked in the door Friday night. I've dealt with her tears, yelling, calling me as though she's having a heart attack when she just wants attention. She called me on my phone when I went to bed. Now she has the vapors and will be in bed all day. Last night she left me a letter apologizing but suggesting at the end that maybe we should look into her moving to a retirement community (which means selling the house and me moving into an apartment while I am trying to find a job).
I wrote her a note back that I would be happy to help her continue to stay here if she would understand that I need mental peace and quiet to think and plan and find a new job. And that if she adds the upheaval of planning a home sale and a move for both of us right now, I won't make it. I have less than six months to get a new job. I can't take on the rest of it. I attached 6 printed out sheets of activities at the Senior Center and at her church and said if you are interested in doing any of these activities just tell me what they are, and I will arrange transportation for you.
As to siblings--my brother is the only one. If she gets him involved then my stress level triples. He is the scary one who invaded my computer, comes to stay in the house unannounced, and was my abuser in childhood. I want him as far away as possible for as long as possible.
I think you made a good suggestion about one evening a week. I have simply got to have my weekends to myself so perhaps that would fend her off. I will make her dinner and offer to play Scrabble. My worry is she will spend the entire time thinking of other non-emergency chores and tasks so I'd leave those evenings with a bunch more worries. But I suppose I could just calmly write them all down and deal with them one at a time. I'll try it and see if it helps. My past experience with her is that giving her even a little extra attention is like starting down a slippery slope. It escalates and before I know it I am exhausted again.
Another thought I have is contacting her church and trying to arrange a weekly visitor for her. She is frantic for attention and maybe that would help.
Thanks much for listening and for the wise suggestions, I truly appreciate it.
Hopalong
-
((((((((Hoppy))))))))))
Sorry about mentioning your sibling. I forgot and it was insensitive of me. I apologise.
I know what you mean about giving a little bit of attention and it's a downward slippery slope, however it could work as I feel they are like children.... and with children what works is fun, consistency and disapline. Obviously you can't disapline her, but it would give her consistency. It would have to be the same evening each week and she would know to expect that as time together. And from your point of view, you know you would have given her some of your time so whatever she trys to insinuate, I feel that you might not feel like a bad daughter as much because you know you've been there. Make any sense? I'm know what I'm trying to say but don't think I'm explaining it very well.
Last night she left me a letter apologizing but suggesting at the end that maybe we should look into her moving to a retirement community
Because of her saying this made me think.... Another thing we have here which I don't know if you have are like rest homes (respite homes they are called over here), but for short term stays. Like if someone is recovering after an operation, or someone who's family are the carer and to give them a break. They will go and stay for a week say once every three months, to give the carer a break.
Very good idea about contacting her church too...
I really hope some of these work out for you... did you get her moved back downstairs now?
Take care
H&H xx
-
thanks, H&H...
she's just too fast for me.
Before I could talk through any of those things I took care of her this a.m. and she wanted to spend the day in her room...brought her breakfast, brought up a lunch, went to church, came back, she was napping, left her a note that I'd be out during the afternoon but everything was set for her lunch...
Not Good Enough. She was annoyed that I wasn't there so by the time I got back at 4:00 she (fully dressed, having a cuppa, had obviously managed just fine)--she had called my Nbrother and he was on his way from halfway across the country. Her excuse: well, I need more HELP, and you didn't say what time you'd be BACK.... (IOW, this is payback because I dared to defy her and take off to give myself a break. I went to see a damn movie.)
I had spent HOURS this wknd assuring her about this and that, fetching and stepping, printing off things from the Internet for her, answering endless questions, etc, etc. We had agreed we'd go chat with her doctor about a home health aide, etc...
Anyway, I lost it. Blew up, bawled and raged. Because I heard him call her back (her phone is amplified) and he said: I'm coming to take care of everything and you and I will go visit the retirement homes tomorrow. Long story shorter, she acknowledged that she'd urged him to come rescue her since "you are too busy to take care of me..." And then I heard him tell her that I am only here because of my "selfish agenda" and that he has to come now to make sure that "she is protected."
After 7 years of changing her diapers (and before that, my father's)--when he was nowhere in sight for DEACDES except for the occasional call and visit, all of a sudden NOW he needs to "take charge." And she's manipulated him, and me...and I have just had it.
It's all over, far as I'm concerned. The only thing I asked her for was to please give me the mental space and serenity I need so that I can find a new job first, before any major changes. So BAM, she creates a huge crisis. She is not sick, was not in danger, was just having an off day. But when I take care of myself, I pay.
She agreed to call him back and put hiim off, so he's coming next week. But my world's up in the air again (no house to count on, and the menacing brother coming to act like he is taking charge).
I can't tell you how much I resent it and I just snapped. I have been so taken for granted by this voracious woman. And my brother has never given one shit about me or my wellbeing. Not once in all the years I've been here has he ever said one word like, "How is it going for you?" Much less, thank you for taking care of our parents...
So I am about to have a nervous breakdown from the stress of it. I loathe her and I fear him (he's unstable, a VietNam vet who's obsessed with guns, and a pathological liar).
I am going to do what I can to get a job and then get out of here. If she's going to sell the house out from under us so she can have room service at a fancy facility, she's welcome to. But I'm not setting my jobhunt aside to prepare the house for sale, and I'm damned if I'll be much interested in visiting.
God, I just can't handle it. Any trace of defiance or assertiveness and she pulls this game. She knows I fear my brother so he's her trump card, and fine. They can have each other. I'm out of here as soon as I can find a job and an apartment. And she can just rent some love, because mine's worn out.
Hopalong
-
I can totally see where you are coming from and how much you are dealing with (((((((((((((((((((Hoppy))))))))))))))))))))
Maybe it's time for Hoppy to be appreciated, and doing that could mean looking after yourself. After all it is your life too.
Whatever you decide to do... know we're here to support you xx
-
And she can just rent some love, because mine's worn out.
Hi Hoppy,
I love this line! And I am so glad that you have had it! I've had it too with your mum. I hate her! She makes me sick! Ok thanks for letting me vent.
I'm totally in a glass house when it comes to this but......trust that the future will work out. I would think that moving will be a big upheaval for you. You might not want to be in a brand new job at the time you move. You might want to be all moved and set up and a little bit over your family's shenanigans.
Since nothing you do will satisfy her, how about doing as little as possible? You are knocking yourself out to look after her and avoid her barbs. It is not working, it is never going to work. Never ever ever. So why keep trying to help her above and beyond the call? Just do the minimum and she will bitch anyway but at least you are not working your fingers to the bone.
At least look around to see where you could move to. Maybe you can find a roomate situation which will not be expensive. Move out now and let those Ns llook after each other. Let your brother come and prepare the house for sale. Unless it is your house or you are getting the money, why should you work to make it ready? Let her hire somebody. Let her hire somebody to bring her #E%^&&* tea upstairs.
You can do it.
Plucky
-
Dear Hoppy - I always wondered what things would be like if I went and lived with my mom to help her in her aging years. My friends have attached themselves to my legs and told me I cannot go.
So, the things you are dealing with - I have dealt with on a smaller level. My mom was forced to go into an independent living facility by her doctor. However, things aren't going so well. She's cheap and wanted people to help her. She manipulated the people - and as a result, they got to see her exactly for what she is. The help is gone.
She felt she was better than others - and has caused problems at the facility. They are considering asking her to leave. While it is encouraging for others to see what the family has had to deal with for years, it is also tough to know the right thing to do. At this point in my life - I run the range of emotions from anger to pity.
I read what you're doing and feel the frustration that you have and am encouraged. You are not alone in your feelings.
-
I can't imagine dealing with your mom. I think mine would be quite the same way, although, she IS old and needs help, but won't admit it. She still has my father to boss around so....so far so good, I guess.
You are a saint! I don't think I could take it. I understand how you feel like there is no other choice though.
Hang in there! Peace, baby! Really, I mean it.
Take care of you.
-
With friends like this forum, I'll survive. Thanks, Plucky and all of you, for venting about my NMom.
It really helped too. I went to my T tonight and told him I'd boiled over and was feeling I hated her. He said something amazing --he's a good and decent person-- "that hate is necessary and it is a gift. It does not mean you don't also love her. You have a whole range of complex feelings about her, including love and hate. And because the rage actually brought some hate up to the surface, which you've always stopped with guilt, it has freed you from her trance and manipulations."
He was right. I am at peace tonight, treating NMom with civility and gentleness but I am more detached than I've ever been in my life. I thank god for that. He told me I'd made a huge leap forward.
In letting go of my insistence on the house dream (he says that's because I associate it with my dad and greatuncle, whom I felt loved by) -- I've freed myself. If nature plays out her days in a way that she is okay with rented help here, then maybe I'll still wind up with the house. But if it needs to be sold so she can go into a nursing home one day, I'll be fine with that too.
I talked (prayed sort of) like a looney to my dad and great uncle last night. Sort of told them. Thanks guys, for all the love you put into building this place. But right now it's turned toxic, and at the end of the day, I have to face that it's still just a building. And it's not worth my mental health or letting myself be stressed into a coronary.
I just feel relief. Now I will focus on my job hunt steady on, and one day at a time. I am no longer a hostage to her house games. Better a pauper than a hostage (which I've heard a lot of healthy voices on this board say in one way or another.) Once I have a steady job, I will be ready to pack up and move on at any moment. (I'm not now, but I will be then. So that's the plan. Not so much to move immediately, but to get myself in a position when I CAN.)
THANK YOU, ALL OF YOU!!! (((((((((((((((H&H, Plucky, Bean, Cat, Surrounded))))))))))))
I'm wiped out, must sleep. But I am very, very grateful to every single one of you who has given me so much understanding, absolution, and support. You have no idea what your voices have meant to me.)
With love,
Hopalong
-
Hopalong,
I am so happy you have gotten over this hump. I am so relieved. Now you can rest.
Plucky
-
Hopalong:
that's because I associate it with my dad and greatuncle, whom I felt loved by
Sort of told them. Thanks guys, for all the love you put into building this place. But right now it's turned toxic
That's exactly how it happened for me to the house I grew up in, that my dad had turned into a home -- my mom turned it into a really toxic object for her power and control. It is really crummy. When you come to think of it, houses are almost living beings and letting go of them can be excruciatingly painful.
I am no longer a hostage to her house games. Better a pauper than a hostage (which I've heard a lot of healthy voices on this board say in one way or another.) Once I have a steady job, I will be ready to pack up and move on at any moment. (I'm not now, but I will be then. So that's the plan. Not so much to move immediately, but to get myself in a position when I CAN.)
:D
Marta
-
Thanks, Plucky. And thanks, Marta...your post about getting the feeling about the house was very comforting.
And by the way, H & H, nothing to apologize for whatsoever about suggesting sibling help! It is so easy to forget or get details mixed up...I've done it and will again I'm sure! (Perhaps you were trying to help me conjure up a replacement brother? :)
Now that I think of it, almost every time I've made friends with a good man, I've explained to them (feeling somewhat choked up), "This is like having a good brother. This is the good brother." I know over the years some of them have been confused by my feeling...but pleased. My own reaction tells me what a deep yearning that was. My brother was both N and malignantly so :). He tries to be otherwise now, but in a pinch does revert to his basic nature. I have to give him credit for seriously trying very hard to become "a good person" under the influences of his gentle wife and his church. I do give him credit for that. But I'll still never feel fully comfortable around him. So if NMom keeps being the puppeteer ("Oh, all I want before I leave this planet is to know my children will get alooooong"). The other night when she started that I said, if you will stop manipulating us, stop stage-managing our relationship and just leave us alone, we might find our own way to some adult relationship. But when you call hiim up and freak him out and "sic him on me", it doesn't help.
I'm not even sure my brother realizes how much she manipulates him and always has. Even when he was in Viet Nam her worry was all about her drama...she tells the tale over and over: "When my son was iin Viet NAM" -- but never refers to what he went through over there or what it did to him. (It just piled on trauma and PTSD onto a personality that was disturbed in the first place.)
Hops
-
((((((((((((((((Hoppy))))))))))))))))
I'm so glad you managed to talk through things with your T, and come out the other side calmer and more at peace. You sound much happier already.
I can relate to so much that you say Hoppy... about your Mum manipulating your brother. My Mum does that all the time... my poor bro doesn't stand a chance, but hey ho. Me and H can see my brother's life mapped out for him.... he will live with Mum and Dad until they die, then there will be an uproar because he will supposed to be paying half of the house to me, and it will be either "can't get a mortgage" or some such thing which will end up with me losing out. I can see it all happening... the only other outcome will be he will meet someone just like Mum, someone who will do everything for him like a "proper wife" should. Ballony and balls.... sorry hun.... (shut up H&H... this is about Hoppy, not you!)
I think it's normal to get attached to where we live and certain people. I do think it's great that you've realised why you feel attached to your house and that has given you the way to let go. A huge step forward indeed.... and I know what you mean about feeling that this is like a good brother. I have a friend like this... a lovely guy.
Take care hon
H&H xx
-
Now that the drama is over, I'm feeling sickened and very sad.
I completely understand why I exploded. As ever, she kept pushing and pushing and pushing and finally went for the button where I am MOST vulnerable (calling in my brother, who traumatizes me). I do understand that this was not a result of planning on her part. Just the completely blind drive for attention that cannot be thwarted. My T said to Ns it feels like life or death. Likewise, for children of Ns, he said it feels like a life or death struggle to find empathy and to be heard.
So, now that it's over, I am not exactly hating myself for it, but sick, sad and sorry. I'm sorry because she is a 95 y/o woman and my rage scared her. I was screaming and she trembled. The day before, when I'd been up and down the stairs for the sixth time attending to her (after begging her not to move back upstairs and her telling me my wishes didn't matter, she would go anyway because the room made her happy)--I could tell she saw my anger in my face. That is forbidden, of course (anger was not allowed in our household, it was TOTALLY repressed, except by my brother toward me)...but she underestimated how "getting back" at me for resisting her demands would backfire. (I didn't know it would happen either.)
She pulled out what to me is an emotional nuke (calling in my brother)...but I was the one who acted like a nuke. She knows that's not who I am...in fact later that evening she suddenly (!!!) started talking about all the loving, compassionate, gentle things I've done for her and my Dad for years and years. (I'm wondering, wouldn't it be nice if she mentioned that to my brother?) Anyway, at some level she knows I'm a good person. And at some level, I know she also wants to be a good person.
It's just a toxic mix. And having shrieked HOW DARE YOU CALL HIM IN BEHIND MY BACK AFTER ALL I'VE DONE FOR THE LAST SEVEN YEARS!! at the top of my lungs. ("How dare you!" sounds pretty narcissistic, doesn't it?) But it is exactly how I felt. Exactly. I was furious.
But I feel sick and sad at having frightened her. When I went upstairs I was sobbing in my bathroom, a kind of sobbing I have not done in many many years. It felt like it was coming from the depths of my being. It was like, all the hurt from childhood coming out all at once. I have told her, over and over, please do not leave me in any way legally entangled with my brother. I have told her, I will have a cordial relationship with him, but would rather you left him the house and me nothing, rather than leave it entangled bewteen the two of us. (She was forever trying to set him up as a sort of "paternal" figure in my future, because he would "take care of things.") The insult of that, when it is I who have taken care of both my parents for decades...(my brother, meanwhile, was terrorizing his own children and going bankrupt, but now they're doing very well) how she always, always, rivets to male attention and assigns males authority and respectability over females, is too much to handle. (Her FATHER abused his DAUGHTERS and my BROTHER abused--not sexually, just bullying--ME! What part of this picture can she not see? How crazy it feels to have her be so worshipful toward her son while I'm "not paying enough attention to me" Cinderella? Anyway, that's how she's wired...)
Anyway, that part got settled some while back when she agreed to leave him all the contents of the house to keep or auction, and me just the building and piano (he doesn't play). And she told me she was now perfectly at peace about that, since after I got her through her 4th or 5th hospitalization, and had slipped another disk lifting her, she said to me, I think that is fair.
Back to the other night. When I was crying those sobs, which I believe were about the betrayal I felt, that she never protected me from my brother in childhood and keeps trying to shove me into his path now... My mother was downstairs sobbing her head off, too.
She suffers too. She is human too. And she is very, very old and I yelled at her until she trembled. I feel sorry for her and guilty for blowing up and I know she does not plan and plot these things. Her manipulations are shallow, impulsive, and just aimed at scratching an itch that she will never be able to soothe, because there is not enough attention (supply) in the entire universe to fill her need. I think it's like a biological drive...not a plot. So why punish her?
I understand it. I forgive it.
But right now, I have to forgive myself, and that's proving hard. I have always been a compassionate and tenderhearted person, gentle with the sick, the old, the vulnerable. Knowing that I can explode like that at someone that old is sickening to me.
I would never, ever strike anyone. Never have. (Well, once I smacked my ex-H on the thigh with a rubber sandal when I was frustrated. And once I took a portable TV in the backyard when he wouldn't stop watching violent wrestling in front of our 3 y/o no matter how many times I asked him to just change the channel while she was in the room...)--and very tidily put it on a large garbage bag and then took a sledgehammer and demolished it.) He watched from the deck with his jaw hanging. And then I missed watching Oprah (I know, we're giving her up for N now) and he gave me a new one for Xmas since I'd felt so guilty. That was very sweet.
And once when my first dog got loose in a flock of chickens and killed several of them and I couldn't make him stop I was so upset I cracked a tree branch over his head.
God, I am confessing the worst secrets of my soul. But anyway, there it is.
It seems to me that I have anger in me that I have never owned, never dealt with. And with Mom pushing the buttons she was pushing, and so relentlessly, and calling my brother, with my defenses weakened by weeks with a hard cold and the grief and fear over losing my job...I just didn't have the strength to hold it back. I am human and I have limits and she simply will not respect them. (Or cannot. That may be the truth of it.)
I do understand what my T said last night, that the rage was necessary for me to come clear, to wake up, to get free of the hostage-to-her feeling. But it's not okay with me to have frightened and traumatized her. She's going to be fine. I just don't know how I feel about myself any more.
Thanks for listening to all this. It was very disorganized
Hopalong
-
((((((((((((((((((((Hoppy)))))))))))))))))))))
Anger is a very primative human response.... it is OK to feel anger and when pushed, we all have expressed it in ways we wished we hadn't. All of us have said things in anger which we later regret, or reacted in a way that when we look back we think we could have behaved/reacted better than we did. The way I see it honey, there is no point to keep going back over it, analyzing it, it's done... time to move on. One thing I would suggest is that if you feel like apologising to your Mum, maybe just apologise for scaring her. Apologise for the way you expressed your anger. Your anger is justified hon... it really is. It maybe could have been expressed in a different way, but the bottom line is, your anger is justified... it is there for a reason. You don't need to feel guilty for being angry and I don't feel it's good to say sorry for being angry.
What you shrieked is what you feel. IMHO I believe that what we say when we are at our angriest is what we feel.... we just could have expressed it in a better way.
That fabulous huge hearted Hoppy is still the same one we all know and love.... She just needs to love herself and know that she hasn't done anything wrong, just reacted in a way that many people would have reacted given the pressure she was under.
Take care
H&H xxxx
-
PS--I just called my Mom to see how she is and I apologized to her for blowing up. She said, oh I didn't even remember you yelling at me. Then she said, oh now I remember you yelled at me a little bit (for the benefit of the cleaning lady) and I thought we weren't going to do that any more. And then she said you are a very good person and a forgiving person.
Then I told her I thought I had blown up so hugely because these were primal feelings that went all the way back to my childhood. She said, yes I believe there were things going on with your brother that we didn't even know about and I've just talked to him about it. (She always believes that she can "talk to people" and straighten out their thinking or experience.) Anyway, I said PLEASE! Don't talk to him about that! I don't want you to talk to him about what's in my head! And she said, well I already did, and he said Mom, I don't even remember that.
I think I believe both of them. He laid in wait for me every single day after school (after I was bullied all day at school) and tormented me from the time I got home until I escaped to bed, whenever their backs were turned. And here I am age 55 still in therapy. I think my brother issues may go even deeper than my issues with NMom. With her, it's at least all visible, it's so surface and verbal. We've dueled our way over the years to a mostly peaceable compromise.
But with HIM, it's totally unaddressed. In the anguished letter to her about how I felt about her saying that he should come manage her estate after she dies "because he knows how to manage things"--when I'd been managing EVERYTHING including her crises and paperwork, for YEARS--that he stole from my computer and sent to himself, I told her how I felt about his treatment of me. He said nothing about that. I finally wrote him and said all these years I have suffered from this and I just really, really need you to say I'm sorry.
So he wrote back "I'm very sorry for the past." Period. I believe him, sort of... I mean, I do want to give him credit and he HAS tried hard to become a nicer person. (My SIL did put one of her kids on a plane to me once because the kid was being an irresponsible teenager and had wrecked a car, again...but she was terrified on the phone, was afraid my brother would turn violent...). Whew. I am just still scared of him.
And the LAST thing I want is for Mom to go on and on at him over the phone about how vulnerable and uneasy and disturbed and intimidated I feel about him (not to mention his recent violation of my property and privacy, which for all I know he did again as he came to town the moment I left to see my daughter a few weeks ago). I just don't want her inviting HIM into my head...I've had a hard enough time getting her out!
I think in her mother-mind, she thinks she's fixing things. She's been pulling the whole family's emotional puppet strings for so long I think it's absolutely impossible for her to stop. Maybe now that I've reached my limit she'll start a campaign with him...after all, making him listen to her insights, such as they are, will supply attention for her. And he probably feels guilty (underneath it all he has absolutely terrible self-esteem) so he'll listen as long as she will talk. I actually feel sorry for him.
I am, genuinely, very sorry that I blew up. It scared her and scared me too. She knows I would never lift a finger or hurt her physically in any way. But there is emotional violence, and I did commit it.
I guess we're each forgiving the other. And me even my brother. I just need them to leave me ALONE. I can heal, and even be strong enough to deal with either of them in small doses, but I just CANNOT be constantly hammered on and criticized and picked at and guilt tripped. I just can't do that any more.
So...I told her again (she ignored my last dozen requests)--Mom, while I'm job hunting I really do need a lot of peace and quiet and calm. If you will wait until I've found a new job, then I'd like us to have one night a week (thank you for this idea, H&H) where we just have dinner together and play Scrabble or just spend time. And she was delighted (have you got a job yet? That'll be the new refrain...) But she was pleased and I do think that will help.
Meanwhile I just have to calm down enough to think straight so I can cope with all the new work on my plate at work, and get my job hunting in full gear. I'm finally over the huge cold so I think I can start focusing now. (I've been offered another freelance contract that would take two months straight, but I think despite needing the money that I have to turn it down. I have less than six months to find a safe continuing job, since this one vanishes July 1. So taking every spare moment to do a short-term freelance gig, no matter how much I could use it, is probably a bad idea. I'm torn about that, though. Sort of think I should be organized and driven enough to accomplish it all at once. I mean, it doesn't take THAT long to dash off letters and send out resumes...and there are very few openings in town now anyway...I dunno what to do.)
She just needs to stay out of my HEAD.
Thanks again, sorry this goes on and on and ON.
Love,
Hopalong
-
Thank you H&H.
Having your forgiveness helps me forgive myself.
And thank you VERY VERY much for the distinction between having legitimate anger and the way I expressed it. I have only yelled at her once before (in seven years) but never like this.
But it's over, and I told her I never intend to blow up like that again.
I do think I need a new, more direct way, of handling her emotional instrusions. I think I need to have my guard completely in place, and when she starts sneaking in her remarks about family and trying to pull the strings, I am going to try saying very politely, Mom, please respect my privacy and do not discuss private things I have told you with my brother.
Mom, I do not want to discuss my brother, or analyse my daughter, or talk about my brother any more. Mom, I have decided I would rather deal with my feelings about my brother privately so please do not try to force me to discuss it. Mom, I am not going to talk about this and please tell me all about the latest book you've been reading. (That'll distract her.)
She just CONSTANTLY wants to talk about everyone's inner motives, character, feelings, and "explain" it all...and she is so completely deaf to how her gossipy judging prying prodding poking invading interfering messages just pile up and up and up.
So I need to flat-out set boundaries around what I will listen to. Whew. Exhausting prospect because if I take those subjects away, she'll feel silenced. But maybe if I get into the habit of asking her lots of questions about places she's travel, nice memories of Dad, etc, etc, every time she strays into toxic territory, that'll be okay.
Or...best of all, if I just ask her, Mom tell me more about how much people love you poem, okay?
Arrggghhhhh!!
thanks again, H & H. You are beyond kind.
((((((((())))))))))))
Hops
-
hey, Hoppy. I just finally read this whole thread.... and something struck me. None of this is your doing. Not the dog, not your brother, not your mother. You were and are not responsible for it. And yet your pain seems to stem from you feeling the need to fix it. And there is no fixing it. No matter how hard you try. You can't stop your mom or brother from being who they are any more than you could stop an animal's instinctual behavoir. Yet you still try. You still want to heal, to fix, to problem solve. I was told the other day that problems come up for me so often BECAUSE I am such a problem solver. And yet I am the one who suffers for it. I take the problem, and the person who really owns the problem just whistles off while I am teetering on one toe with twenty heavy boxes of everyone else's pain!
You are such a deserving and sweet soul. Healthy people see you as a problem solver and appreciate it and love you for it.... but those in pain see it as an open invitation to dump and dump and dump. I know it's tough, and that is something I can very much relate to. You SEE how they feel, you FEEL how painful things are for them and because of this, you remain stuck in handling it.
The hardest thing I am learning is that other people NEED their pain to learn. When I take it FOR them....I am in the way. Nothing really changes, as a matter of fact, it may get worse, and then I am depleted, depressed and my life is not my own.
Would it be a possibility for you to simply LET your brother look like your mother's rescuer? LET your mother get angry when you don't always do her bidding? LET them be, Let the situation be? I don't mean a ducks back kind of thing, I mean, c'mon, you do FEEL it, and you are doing a great job of venting (very important, mind you) but that last step......letting it be and moving on with YOUR life. Letting your mom be who she is, without you wanting something different, or without you allowing everyone else's opinion be more important than yours.
It's OKAY to want a better life. It's OKAY not to feel guilty or responsible for everyone else's feelings. You know you are not going to suddenly turn into a selfish person......dishing guilt is just the N's way of keeping you in that same pattern with them that they like!
They hit us kind folks with the "you are so SELFISH" cry and we BUY IT!!! We CHOOSE to buy it.
Hoppy, I think you are marvelous. You deserve more....and you already know this. What would it take for that to manifest in your life?
-
Thank you so much, Mum. I think it will take making peace with myself, and then I can make peace with my mistakes and also with her...the challenge of her, the terminal humanness of her, the extreme age and physical vulnerability of her. I monsterize her and I really do believe so much of her behavior is unconscious. It almost FEELS malevolent to the recipient...but it's not. She is so cut off from the simple intention of a person who was not damaged in the ways she must have been in childhood...that I forget she is only mortal. Aggravating and exhausting and self-absorbed in the extreme, but mortal.
I love what you said about letting the chips fall where they may. Trying not to fix all of it nor own more than my share.
Tonight my discussion group talked about the difference between being good and being authentic, being honest and being kind....what is it to find the self, what
I have had so much to process in the last few days and this forum has had everything to do with getting through it. Felt near breaking point but so much comfort here made a huge difference.
The hardest thing I am learning is that other people NEED their pain to learn. When I take it FOR them....I am in the way. Nothing really changes, as a matter of fact, it may get worse, and then I am depleted, depressed and my life is not my own.
This is profound and I want to think about it for a long time.
Thank you so much for sharing what you've learned.
With a measure more peace than I had 24 hours ago, and a huge measure more gratitude,
Hopalong
-
Hopalong,
You have received wonderful support and help. I wanted you to know I echo all the above.
I had no idea of all that you have on your plate. I took care of my parent that were not n's and I was exhausted emotionally and physically. So I can't even imagine your stress. Oh and I understand how you must feel when she calls your brother. I shudder for you. Keep him away for your sanity.
How much more could you take.
You are human, you are doing an angels work, bless you and take care of you.......please!
quote from mum: Hoppy, I think you are marvelous. You deserve more....and you already know this. What would it take for that to manifest in your life? DITTO (((((((((((seasons))))))))))
-
Hi Hoppy,
I can only try to imagine the depth of guilt you feel for finally, even accidentally, giving voice to all your anger and frustrations. I am so sorry you feel this guilt. I don't see how you have stood it for so long. Just reading about it makes me so angry. You are such a wonderful person. The qualities you have will blossom once you get her out of your head.
I don't know if you want to hear this right now. But I do not think your guilt is justified. You did not maliciously attack your mother. You only failed to control the tidal wave of anger that has been building up in you for years, and that you are never permitted by her to express in any way. It is not your fault that you have these feelings. Feelings are feelings. And in your case, they are totally justified.
To embrace guilt in response to having or expressing those feelings would be to deny your feelings. To deny reality. To deny the truth.
If there were some normal way to express those feelings, you would have done so. Youhave tried everything you can manage. You have asked only for little crumbs of consideration and compassion. The answer was always no. You also have other concerns in your life. Your mother shows zero regard or you, for your feelings, etc.
Yes, she can shed crocodile tears after she drives you to your breaking point. And you respond as she wants, not as she deserves.
Yes, she is 93. 93 years of lies, manipulation, selfishness, control. I do not see why having lived so long, when the life has been a testament to selfishness and cruelty, ought to entitle anyone to continue that behaviour without repercussions. On the contrary, if she is ever going to realise anything about herself, now is the last call. If you are going to stand up for yourself to her, the time is approaching.
Your mother is more than living wth you. She is inside your head. Her revenge for your daring to stand up to her, she didn't even have to exact. She has installed herself in your mind to do that. You will have a lot of work to get that blaming, belittling voice out. I think you have already taken a few steps in that direction.
You have support from us and from your T to keep going. I wish there were something I could do to help you along. All I can say is, you don't need to apologise for anything up here. Come and allow your friends to support you.
Plucky
-
You kiddin', Plucky? You wish there was a way to help?
Lord, you HAVE. All of you have.
In a way I may look back on the blowup as the beginning of my salvation.
Not quite yet, I'm still kind of sick. Not groveling or apologizing anymore, just sad.
In fact, the way I feel right now, still in the same house, reminds me of a dying marriage.
(Ewww. Have I been marrried to NMom? The thought's crossed my mind as a joke, but...)
She just started toying with me again (there is ALWAYS manipulation, the threat of payback) by saying,
oh you know, I've got to get another lawyer, just didn't like that guy...
[--What? I thought it was all settled two years ago? Not possible to leave that sore place in me in peace.]
I just said, do what you need to do, but if you're making changes that will have a big effect on my life, I'd really appreciate it if you'd tell me.
She says, oh there are lots of things I might do...but of course they'd all be for your benefit.
And then it clicked. Do Not Eat the Antifreeze... (If I decide I NEED to know what she's going to do or not do...then I'm hooked. And she can toy with that bruise forever. If I say to myself, you don't have to know, you have to be sane and calm and guard your health, then I am free.)
Then she asks me to bring her food, and I do, and she says in this gooey voice: awww, you shouldn't have (she has said that for years right after getting people to do things for her---she makes so many speeches that "sound" like concern and gratitude that you eat up the praise and keep hopping)..
I think the worst part is wanting to believe more in that small piece of real love I did feel from her when I lost my job. That was real. It's painful to block my own love. I guess I do still love her, it just hurts to.
I know that I shocked and scared her (and on a deeper level than she can admit, enraged her), and she will never let her anger out directly, so there will be more manipulation and maneuvering.
One decision I can make is just be too busy to drive her to the lawyer if she decides to take the house away now. (She very well might, or she might not. She's played will games before...it's what makes her feel powerful because she knows I want the house.) I don't think I should help her hurt me. And if she won't tell me what she's planning, that hurts me. Soon-to-be-jobless tired me.
I still want it. But in the last few days the power of that want has loosened a great deal. People talk about "letting go" as though it's one easy opening of the hand...I don't find it that way, it's more like a rope (noose?) unraveling one strand at a time.
thanks all...hope I don't bore you to absolute death with this.
I think my relationship with her (and my brother) is the core source of my lifetime craziness.
My daughter got it too, but she's caught on so much earlier than I did. That's a blessing.
(I wish I had shielded her, but I let my mother spend waaaaaay too much time w/her before I knew about Narcissism.)
Well, life's long. A nice man at work was commiserating when I had to go pick up a computer thingie, we just got to chatting and he has a manipulative elderly Dad. He said, hey look at her this way, if she's 95, at 55 you're barely halfway through!
Hopalong
-
And then it clicked. Do Not Eat the Antifreeze... (If I decide I NEED to know what she's going to do or not do...then I'm hooked. And she can toy with that bruise forever. If I say to myself, you don't have to know, you have to be sane and calm and guard your health, then I am free.)
Yeeessss! The Golden Rule of Ns. DO NOT NEED ANYTHING FROM THE N. Ns are like those drug pushers in 1970's movies. They give you or offer you something only to get you hooked, exploit you, rob you, suck the life from you, then discard you.
So don't need nor accept anything from the N. It's a Trojan Horse.
I have gone so far as to get rid of my mother's gifts to me. Not that they are anything I want anyway.
I think the worst part is wanting to believe more in that small piece of real love I did feel from her when I lost my job. That was real.
Maybe. An N can express real love sometimes. As the old saying goes, even a blind squirrel finds a nut evey now and then.
One decision I can make is just be too busy to drive her to the lawyer if she decides to take the house away now.
Great idea. When she asks you to take her, before she even tells you when, tell her you can't. Then when she tells you when, say "I can't." Don't say sorry. She's had more than her share of sorrys from you! When she changes the appointment, tell her you can't. When she asks what time you can take her, just say you will let her know if a time crops up when you can. Then never bring it up again. When she brings it up again, tell her you will let her know. If she won't let it go, pick a date way in the future, or a date you know she can't. If in the future, tell her at the last minute that you can't. For rescheduling, start back at the beginning.
He said, hey look at her this way, if she's 95, at 55 you're barely halfway through!
What does that mean? That she only ruined half your life? Well, claim all the rest back now!
Plucky
-
She says, oh there are lots of things I might do...but of course they'd all be for your benefit.
I agree with Plucky (((((Hoppy)))))
This struck me as well.... Do you not know what to do for your benefit?
I think you know what benefits you, not your Mum doing what she thinks is beneficial to her daughter. She's treating you like a child here, where you're the one who's looking after everything, doing everything. And she makes me angry too... Your anger is totally justified.
Hugs
H&H xx
-
Bingo, Plucky, about the not needing. Even when I try to scare myself with extreme poverty fantasies, I have two friends who've said they'd never let me go without a roof over my head. And a church family. So I really can believe, if I am willing to, that my whole life can slip down a few rungs of the economic ladder and still be full of love, friends, church, sunshine, breezes, music and happiness. It's all up to me. And you're soooo right, Plucky, that the key is not needing her legacy. If one comes, that's gravy. But I need to be my own meatloaf.
(With magnificent metaphors like that, you know I must be a great poet, right?) :shock:
I didn't mean that I would try to block her from visiting her lawyer if she decides to create a new will and force the sale of our house...I wouldn't do that. She can always ask our cleaning lady (who also sometimes will take her to non-urgent doctors' appointments). I just meant that I think I should not actively help her to hurt me. If she rearranges her estate again so it's not possible for me to inherit the house, or if she sets it up so I must negotiate with my brother, that will hurt me and she knows it. So I would not participate by being her chauffeur for that appt. Or, my brother could come to town and she could go with him, set up whatever she wants. (I have no idea what she plans to do and she may wind up not doing anything. She's just mailed my brother a long letter. But the most important thing I can do is...what Mum said. LET the chips fall where they fall. That's my job.)
H&H, thank you so much for stating the obvious that I don't see while I'm letting my emotions and thoughts be hijacked by her running commentary, nudging, prodding, poking, and steering of me. You are exactly spot on. I do know what is to my benefit. More than any piece of economic security, it's serenity. Sanity. Peace.
And my mother is not capable of not trying to control the way you would control a child. She cannot relate any other way. It's not conscious, just hard-wired. She is anxious and very dependent. I just ordered a book about dealing with difficult aging parents, and the summary of a dependent parent (meaning emotionally, not the very legitimate physical stuff) sounded so much like her. Lightbulb. It's not only Nism, it's that mixed with high dependency.
This has helped a lot. Thanks for reading it.
PS to Cat and Seasons--DONT DO IT!!!
-
Hopalong---I have been reading these posts and something that struck me yesterday but I told myself to leave it alone, but it still bothers me. You said your mother talked to your brother about you. And about how you felt. Was that her right, really? Seems like someting more going on here. I know you can't stop her, but do you think it is possible that she is now using him to get back at you? Gang up on you? You have crossed her. My mother has done the same kinds of things and she uses my siblings as her allies to launch attacks, guilt trips, manipulations, punishments on me. You also mention she sent him a large letter?? Does this bother you or is it normal?
I now I am not the healthiest person to give advice, but I know that I have stayed by my husband's side for way too many years caring for him and babying him and doing anything he wished all the while hoping he might be able to produce something physical (money) I could show for it. I figured, heck, I might as well come out with something. I sometimes feel he has made financial blunders just to keep me around hoping and needing. I am now ready to give this up. I don't care. It would be nice, but I can't control any of that.
My mom also threatens to leave all her assets (not much, I think, but who knows, she is such a tight-wad) to the church. (Cult--in this case). I don't care anymore, I actually never did, we never had anything growing up from her so why expect it now. It really would have been nice to have emotional assets from her during her lifetime or my childhood even, but---I can only deal with the non-existence of our relationship at this point of my life. Sure, her cruelty of leaving her kids with nothing will upset me, but it won't break me. It's just stuff. I almost expect it.
Anyway, you can't control her. Don't let her control you. But, IMO, be aware of a gang-up of the "innocents" being planned against you by mom and brother. I hope I am wrong. It just doesn't seem like they have much compassion for anyone but themselves----I can't believe your brother says he can't remember bullying you. What a jerk!!! Do you think he has changed? I have seen everyone's very worst side come out when it comes to money......
Sorry if this is way off base, or if I have crossed the line. I am concerned, though. Take care. Hugs, babe!!
-
Hey Seasons,
Yes, it bothers me, since she was secretive once before with estate planning and now if she wants to get closer to my brother because I've pulled away...they indeed could "gang up." But she can do want she wants with her property. I wanted it to stay "home" but it really is just property.
Even if they do...the worst that could happen is I endure the weirdness. And move on. I have nothing much to lose. If I stop letting the fear of losing the house dominate me, there's nothing anybody can hold over my head.
I am trying to focus on finding a new job. I don't fear theft or anything. I don't know what my brother could do to me. If he comes here and stays again, that would be hard. But he'll come eventually. I hope by that time the atmosphere has eased. If it has not, I'll call my minister and ask her to come over and help us work through some of these things. And I think neither my mother nor brother would refuse that.
I THINK she was probably just writing him one of her distraught preachy things about family, but maybe she was sending some sort of document (a copy of the will?). I don't know and would like not to care. She did say (I believe her) that she's been awake since 2 a.m. because she's so worried about my brother and me. What she means is, she was horrified to discover the depth of my resentment and rage and now realizes there is no friendship between him and me. (She's always, always prattled on about it, but I think it's just now dawning on her that talking for years and years about a mythical family closeness has not made it happen--she's lectured and sermonized me and my daughter to death, and now she knows the underlying feelings.) I do sympathize because she's been the victim of her own denial and magical thinking. (She kept her own dad's abuse a secret from me for 40+ years, I only found out because a cousin told me...so her denial skills go deep.) She wants us to stay a family. I don't know how. I do want a loving relationship with him but not a close one. I'll just see if time heals anything.
There's no point in me being vigilant about her relationship with him or trying to control it (that's what she's always done to me). I had sent him a friendly "calm down, Mom is fine" email...reminding him what she's like with the alarms when she wants attention. If he wants to see it realistically, he will (he does know on some level). If he wants to stay hooked in the triangulation or let her manipulate him into making me an enemy, he will.
Nothing I can do about it. Trying to anticipate what she--or he--may be up to is just anxiety making. I'm already anxious about so many things I want to do what I can to avoid adding more to my mind.
The letter did make me wonder of course. But I politely put it in the mailbox for her and off it's gone.
I'm just going to try not to fantasize.
She is very upset now and I do feel sorry for her. I'm sad too. Feel sick at heart that all this happened and as though something is broken (I know, it was a spell) that can never be mended.
I hope we heal in some way. I am being polite but very guarded.
I'm just going to pray she finds some peace. I wish I had extra to share with her.
Hops
-
I'm just going to pray she finds some peace. I wish I had extra to share with her.
Hoppy, you are too good for this world.
Call me cynical, but....
I don't think you are going to have a good relationship anytime with your brother. Maybe I am wrong. I don't think you are going to heal things with them. If things start to look quiet again, it will be because you have swallowed down your thoughts, feelings, and rights again. I don't think a session with your pastor will help. Ns lie, and they would love to portray you as whatever served them to your pastor, and this will impact your relationship with someone you rely on. But maybe I am wrong. I don't think the atmostsphere has eased. N-hood has a half-life longer than radiation. I don't think your mother will find any lasting peace. How can she do so, when she is in denial about everything important in her past and present, as well as still mistreating the only person who has ever taken wonderful care of her?
Hoppy,
your family is so toxic it is going to take the superfund to clean it all up. But you will. You are making progress and that is how it's done. I'll be here to cheer you on.
Plucky
-
Sometimes I think fear of the old phrase-----"Her OWN MOTHER!!" -----makes us do things we would otherwise advise someone else to definitely NOT put up with.
MAYBE----we should be telling OURSELVES-----"Her OWN DAUGHTER!!!"
These people certainly have a hold on our psyche--don't they?
Just thoughts!
Take care.
-
Hi guys,
I'm still feeling kind of sick and horrible.
It feels like something's irretrievably broken.
Mom and I are polite and calm again but nothing's healed.
I overheard her talking to my brother (all of a sudden he calls regularly) and she was saying, "yes, she's having a rough time but it's due to her own choices..."
Like I chose to lose my job? Get slipped disks? Become completely burned out?
Oy. It is so obvious that he's going to be the hero now. Seven years of caring for her and all this struggle, and in one tantrum I said things I can never take back and that she'll never forgive. (At one point that night when I was raging about how betrayed I felt she said things like oh but we have always loved you, etc...and I was so bitter I just kind of spat at her, that's just TALK.) What a horrible thing to say.
I think it's because my mother has literally talked me out of my own mind for 50 years. Lectures, sermonettes, homilies, calls, messages, notes, in the thousands. I cannot think straight...or I couldn't.
In spite of everything we talk about here, it doesn't feel completely good to be "awake"...last illusions gone...
I don't know when I've felt so defeated.
The other thing is, even if people like you here, who understand the frustrations of dealing with an N parent, offer absolution and sympathy for my loss of control...you're rare rare rare.
I feel like I don't know myself any more. I used to be so sweet and steadily kind, even when my patience was tried. Now I feel as though I've become someone I don't recognize, and I don't like myself any more. I'm no longer convinced I'm a good person. When I came home and first started this (I had promised my dad when he was dying that I'd always take good care of her)...it was for all the right reasons. I really did have a strong belief in not "warehousing" the old. It was only after several years of waiting on her hand and foot while paying her a hefty "rent" for my 2 little rooms that my resentment began...a friend told me I was "an au pair who pays for the privilege." And then Mom would drop remarks all the time about how when she passed away we'd of course have to sell the house so my brother could have "his half"--and meanwhile he never once, ever (still has never) contacted me to ask how anything was going for me. Ever. It was always, is everything perfect for her.
That built...resentment and Cinderella feelings built...and I finally told her I would like to discuss what her plans were. And that even if it wasn't a perfect 50-50 split, I thought it would be fair to let me stay in the house and he could auction all the contents. (This is one of the most expensive towns in the state and I could never afford even a bungalow here how...plus, there's a mortgage on it so it wouldn't be a "free house" anyway.) She said, you think you should have your brother's share because you "just live here"? At that point I realized I was completely taken for granted. I'd been cutting her toenails, cleaning her when she was ill, doing her paperwork, helping her entertain her friends, seeing her through every crisis imaginable (4 or 5 hospitalizations), taking her here and there, listening to her ENDLESS talk...and it was just her due because that's what a "good daughter" does. He on the other hand was "too busy." But at the end of it all, I'd be out on the sidewalk.
So she's right, I did begin to have selfish reasons along with my earlier, altruistic commitment to caring for her for the rest of her life. After I learned about Nism and it began to dawn on me how she didn't see any value in my care...I started to feel that I was "earning" my inheritance. I know that's wrong, but that's how I felt. And after a while she changed her mind and said she also thought it was fair.
It's also hard to make myself get things done...I'm hiding in my room unless I'm at church or escape to work or a quick outing. When I'm in the house I'm mostly hiding. Not getting anywhere with the job hunt though I'm doing an excellent job in the current position (got nice boss feedback this week).
The hard part is feeling I'm standing in the ashes of an illusion and there's nowhere to go. I don't know how I can pretend or "act" well enough to keep the charade going. It's really over but I can't walk away until I have a secure job...I have nowhere to go.
The one bright piece is I told my daughter what had happened and she was totally understanding.
Thanks...sorry...
Hopalong
-
Hi there Hoppy,
I am so sorry to hear the pain you are going through. You are one of the nicest, most patient people I have ever run across. It does not seem fair that you should be punishing yourself this way.
It feels like something's irretrievably broken.
Something is. Your illusion. I would be surprised if you were ever able to put it back together again. It may seem that this is a tragedy but I am hoping that one day you will see it as the beginning of a new life for you.
(At one point that night when I was raging about how betrayed I felt she said things like oh but we have always loved you, etc...and I was so bitter I just kind of spat at her, that's just TALK.) What a horrible thing to say.
It is the TRUTH. The truth is always better than a lie. Maybe her voice inside your head would tell you it is a 'horrible thing to say.' Because she has no answer for that. Because it is true. Keep speaking truth, even if it is not 'nice', even if it is not easy, not approved of, not permitted. Everyone needs to let the truth out.
In spite of everything we talk about here, it doesn't feel completely good to be "awake"...last illusions gone...
Maybe if you think about it like an operation you needed. You're still in recovery. The anesthesia of your anger has worn off and now you feel the pain. Well, it will heal. And it will be better. And it was necessary. But now it hurts all get out. You may not be able to escape the pain but you can endure it until it subsides.
I started to feel that I was "earning" my inheritance.
Maybe you were also 'earning' her love. And maybe it all hurts so much because that is not going to come to you either. Maybe now it is clear that there is no love there to get. You've worked so hard to deserve it, one way or another. You have sacrificed. You have endured. It had built your character into a strong, patient, unselfish, hardworking person. But it did not earn the nonexistent caring of your mother. What you are trying to get, maybe it does not exist. You think your brother is getting it - but I don't think he is getting 'love' either from your mother. She is just putting him in the apparent position that you want. If she loves him so much, why does she only call on him when she needs to control you?
The hard part is feeling I'm standing in the ashes of an illusion and there's nowhere to go. I don't know how I can pretend or "act" well enough to keep the charade going. It's really over but I can't walk away until I have a secure job...I have nowhere to go.
The good thing now is that you are discarding the painful life you have been living. The hard part is to see where to go next and what to live. As long as you focus on this goal, you will sort it out in good time.
Don't apologise for posting here, for working through your stuff. We care about you and want to see you through it.
A rare
Plucky
-
Hi Hop,
I also am so sorry to hear what angst you are going through. You ARE such a sweet and supportive person. I have seen that in so many of your posts!
I read through most of this thread. What I wish most is that you would stop punishing yourself by feeling guilty -- so I did a web search and put together some excerpts (written by Vaknin) about why you should not feel guilty. I hope it helps!
***
The abuser is GUILTY. He could have PREVENTED the abuse. He KNOWINGLY did what he did. He is CULPABLE. You hate him JUSTLY.
Hating yourself is a way of assuming the abuser's guilt. The abused child thinks: A parent can never be guilty. Parents are perfect, above reproach, above vile thoughts. It is prohibited to think badly about a parent. It must be I who is wrong and guilty and corrupt in hating my parents. I should be ashamed of myself.
It is a conflict. It is the confusion that you are experiencing. Especially since you have always been an extension of the parent and hating yourself is, therefore, no real solution.
Very often we feel that perhaps we collaborated with the abusing parent, seduced or tempted or angered or provoked him or her.
This is the crux of your problem. Your inability to distinguish the child that the abuser once was (deserving of pity and empathy) - from the monstrous adult that the abuser became, which is deserving of condemnation, contempt, hate, punishment, repulsion, and reticence. As long as you do not cease confusing these two - you will be immersed in conflict, confusion, and pain. You HAVE to sacrifice the image of your parent if you want to get better. You have to let go. You must hate in order to be able to love again. You must place guilt, blame, rage, contempt where they belong.
You cannot prevent PAST bad things from happening by feeling in the PRESENT.
Understanding, loving, compassion, empathy - must be directed at the deserving. Not to love an Hitler - is NOT EQUAL to fostering a world without feelings. One can HATE and detest Hitler passionately, vehemently, wholeheartedly - and still be loving, compassionate, full of emotions and beauty. Actually I think that hating Hitler is a PRECONDITION to experiencing true feelings. If you do not hate an Hitler something is very wrong with your emotional equipment. If you do not despise a monster - you are INCAPABLE of adult feelings, your emotional intelligence is infantile and immature. Hating an abuser - is a sign of emotional maturity, not of emotional retardation.
It is wrong to UNIVERSALIZE your feelings. Can't you SEGREGATE them? For instance: can't you love your spouse WHILE hating your abusive parent? Must you love EVERYONE, all the time? Are you so terrified of being rejected?
You love monsters. You try to understand abusers. You make excuses for the inexcusable. You mitigate your private holocaust. You legitimize abhorrent crimes. You lie to yourself. You are immorally not in touch with your real emotions. And, this way, you perpetuate your own abuse, your own torture, you collaborate with the terrorists that are and were your family.
I am an Israeli. When we encounter a terrorist with hostages, we kill him first, we ask questions later. NOTHING can justify, mitigate, explain, account for, ameliorate, or alleviate what your parent did to you. I judiciously refrain from using the phrase "what WAS DONE to you". Instead, I repeat the sentence: "What HE DID to you". It was pre-meditated.
****
I don't know if that helps, but I hope there is something in there to support you!
I worry very much about you allowing yourself to feel guilt. I know that someone who was very close to me who has tried to dissociate herself from an N ex-spouse who abused her for over a decade feels so much guilt for the OUT AND OUT HATRED she felt toward him at the end of their marriage. She had never hated anyone before -- much less hated anyone so MUCH -- and now she seems to be trying to appease her guilt with a sense of obligation to her abuser. That guilt is a real stickler -- as in sticking it to you!!! Rather than looking at what you did or felt that makes you feel so guilty, how about looking on the YEARS and YEARS of abuse you have sustained? You SHOULD feel angry. I like what Vaknin has to say about how important it is to go through this phase. Please don't hijack it with guilt which could deprive of you finally feeling truly FREED.
Also, from what I understand about N's, I wonder if perhaps your mother is doing this bit with your brother more for N supply than anything else -- kind of like, "Well, I'm not getting enough, I need more, so I'll call him!" Because really, to N's, NOTHING is about YOU -- it's all about THEM. I kind of wonder if she calls your brother so much to manipulate you as she does to get her N supply. Because for N's, it's all about THEM and it's all about SUPPLY -- and really nothing is much ever about anything else.
My best friend has an N mother who her T has told her is very toxic to her, and I once jokingly told her, "Well, maybe you could fake some N supply, and do it like an actress -- while inside just allow yourself to be detached and calm." I don't know if it would be a good way to go, and apologize if this is a bad idea, but when I imagine myself having to be in your shoes I think I might very well take that route -- i.e., use my understanding of the N psychology to some advantage just to get some peace.
Look. This might all be crazy talk. What do I know? Not much! But in case it stimulates any good ideas I'll just throw out these ideas. From what I understand, N supply comes basically in two forms that they love to eat up -- preferably adulation, admiration, etc., but when they can't get that they feed off FEAR. If they can't get you to adore them, then getting you to fear them is "better than nothing." Perhaps giving her some "acted out" (but fake) praise and adoring N supply would deflate her interest in frightening you. Perhaps she has caught on that you are somewhat frightened by your brother, and that would mean that she knows she can frighten you with every phone call to him. But she loves admiration and adoration more, so maybe if you pretend the admiration then she will prefer that so much more that she won't want to cause fear.
Also, since what she WANTS is you to fear her, then more play-acting might be very nice to use when she really DOES cause fear in you -- play-acting feeling INDIFFERENT and giving such acts ZERO attention, which might make her feel that she does not want to use those tactics which cause indifference in you.
Last, I wanted to throw out another idea that I know I would want if I were you, which is my own private space -- away from the house. Maybe in your town there is cooperative housing which would be cheap, or even just rooms for rent in people's homes. Once you have just a little money to do it with, you could start building your dreams of your life away from her (and your brother) during visits there. And go there to pray, etc., in an environment where you can really feel SAFE and AUTONOMOUS and INDEPENDENT -- and just "away from all that." It could be your secret place that she and your brother don't even know about.
Well, that's all of my wild advice for now... Sorry if it's not very helpful. I just wish I could find some way to help. You are so deserving of help and you know lots of us hear are really rooting for you!! (Any Australians reading this -- no, I didn't mean it that way! -- rooting meaning something quite else over in Oz.)
BIG GIANT HUGS........!
pink
-
Hey Hoppy!
I've been away from the board for a while and am trying to catch up a little.
(((((((((Hoppy)))))))))
Dear lord, what a struggle! You are so inundated with her needs you can barely remember your own... :(
One of my themes too is the not needing. I wouldn't even fight for things that were mine and give stuff away when Nbro nagged me for it. Here, just take it. He was sooooooooo obnoxious and grabby. Still is in a quieter sort of way. Always scoping for resources. He is also the one who posed like the "hey, I'm not interested in my inheritance and agree you should 'die broke' Dad!" heh heh heh. How disarming of him. I also think (some backwards perverse grandiosity) that I could live on the street with nothing because I don't need anything. This is a total delusion but I used to believe it when I was younger. But I think Marta also meant "don't need anything they got now, don't hold your breathe that they will give you anything in return for anything." It's a one-way street for sure. Whatever carrot they have they will give to the one they are sucking up to, not the one who is taking care of them. In other words, why buy the cow when the milk is free (remember that one? kinda fits with Ns). Want to have fun? Pack your suitcase and take a hotel room for a day or two.
Anyway, you should inform your mother to kindly butt out of the communication between you and your brother. Why does she care if you "get along" or not? What does it matter? Many siblings who think well of each other are busy living their own adult lives. They decide what effort they will make to stay in touch.
Of course I have a book recommendation. It isn't really an advice book like it sounds, but quite validating for adult children of ghastly seniors: "Doing the Right Thing" by Roberta Satow. Don't be put off by the title--it is really quite helpful to read anecdotes about adult kids loaded with the same powerful feelings you and I have about our Ns. I guess there are other books on this subject, but I read this one and it really helped to read about others in similar family dynamics.
I have noticed in your posts that you grant your mother all kinds of understanding about her feelings ("she's human, too") but can barely afford yourself the same understanding and acceptance of your feelings. I think it's because you don't want to be "like your mother" so any time you express a need, you perhaps feel like you are being "like your mother" unconsciously. ???
I felt/feel this way sometimes. It helped to tell my mother what I tell myself during these emotional crises of dealing with my dad (just imagine the elderly germaphobic reclusive Howard Hughes and you get the idea), it helped to tell her it isn't "selfish" to think of your own survival. My father would repeatedly browbeat us with the mantra that he was entitled to his feelings until one day I shouted at him WELL SO AM I!! Your mother's emotional neediness is a carbon copy of my father's!
I so want to take this burden from you Hoppy. Why don't you just tell your mom to live with Nbro if he's so great? I also relate to your frustration about unacknowledged bs. He does remember but won't take responsibility for crapping on you. My brother at least admitted (cuz he was verbally dumping about Ndad) that it was "every man for himself" growing up in our house, that is, he didn't help me and I didn't "help" him, although I sort of did by not fighting back. He is a chip off the old block. That's why mom loves him so.
Anyway Hops, it's ok to be angry at your mother. It doesn't mean you don't love her. you need to and I'm wow'd by your T's insights. Hope this helps a little bit...this thread helped me!
Take care, MP
-
You can't imagine what it means to wake up at 5 a.m. and come on board and find all this love, support, insight, and effort. I am so grateful. I am truly blown away. Thank you all.
MPiggy, it helps a lot to have you say it's okay that I not boldly go live in a motel (which I couldn't afford anyway). This helped: I could live on the street with nothing because I don't need anything. This is a total delusion...
and so did this: it's ok to be angry at your mother. It doesn't mean you don't love her.
Plus, the reminder it's okay to remind her I have survival concerns too.
This is a big idea, MP, and I am going to try to really take it in: you grant your mother all kinds of understanding about her feelings ("she's human, too") but can barely afford yourself the same understanding and acceptance of your feelings. I think it's because you don't want to be "like your mother" so any time you express a need, you perhaps feel like you are being "like your mother" unconsciously. ???
I think I can dish it out (advice) but not take it because I recall more than once advising others on this board to be compassionate toward themselves, really love themselves. And you're right, refusing to forgive myself is the same mistake...withholding love from myself won't produce more love somewhere else. Thank you.
Plucky, thank you:
The anesthesia of your anger has worn off and now you feel the pain. Well, it will heal. And it will be better. And it was necessary. But now it hurts all get out. You may not be able to escape the pain but you can endure it until it subsides.
I got the fearful gene from her, too...and I really did need reminding I can endure this and it will pass. Thank you. Reassurance gratefully vacuumed. You are "rare", in the best sense!
Pink: thank you for caring.
I fear Vaknin, though I understand what he's saying. I just am never convinced that I accomplish anything by hating. It's the old hate the sin but love the sinner training. I don't want to sustain the flash of hate I felt. I hate the hate. But I will listen hard to the other things about not internalizing abuse of myself in some kind of weird reaction to her and my brother's way of seeing me. Thank you, and your whole post did help me keep thinking. I need to remember I still have a brain!
I also love your "escape hatch" idea and I have one! A dear friend from church is giving me a key to her house (and she lives nearby) so I can just go there. If my brother ever arrives and I feel threatened I can go there, and likewise, anytime. I won't do it often (getting out is the problem) but the safety valve of her kind offer means a lot. I need to remind myself I won't die of this. (The chapel near where I work is also a good place to go for little meditation breaks during the day....although my own office is so isolated I can relax here too.) Her offer is as much a placebo kind of retreat. I usually don't like to go there because of cat reek, but friend love can overcome the smell!
This helped too: You cannot prevent PAST bad things from happening by feeling in the PRESENT.
Thanks, Plucky.
Surrounded: For some reason your post reminded me that one thing I also bellowed, while I was bellowing, was that I am a GOOD DAUGHTER (dammit, albeit a loud one at that moment!) and I am not ashamed of the job I have done. She was so stunned she just kept nodding, yes you are... That won't cure anything long-term of course but it did feel good to say that to her. All she could say was well No-One has EVER spoken to me the way you have...and that's true. But even with an outburst like that on my record, I can say to the heavens and not be lying at all: I am a good daughter.
I think I'll try to hold that thought, and go back to a bit of supply just to keep the peace, and keep on keeping on...
Thanks, all, so very much.
Love,
Hops
-
You cannot prevent PAST bad things from happening by feeling in the PRESENT.
Thanks, Plucky.
Whoops, that was Pink. Dang, when you're getting THIS MUCH AMAZING SUPPORT IT'S HARD TO EDIT IT ALL RIGHT AND GIVE THANKS IN THE RIGHT ORDER! :P
Hope every one of you realizes how moved I am by the unique understanding from each of you.
Plucky, I believe you--all of you:
We care about you and want to see you through it.
Thanks.
-
PS, Miss Piggy, I just ordered Doing the Right Thing. Just the excepts Amazon lets you see were healing. Even occurs to me that it might be a book I could send on to my brother on the chance it might help him see I have reasons for my "selfishness". But I'll wait and see.
Maybe if anyone else knows a book that might engender some understanding from him (like her, he's not all bad, but has that typical N hollowness and lack of empathy)... send titles! Thanks.
-
Hi Hoppy,
You are soooo altruistic. But. You probably cannot fix your brother. If he is ever going to be fixed, he has to recognise that he needs fixing first. You cannot make him see the light. Save your own skin. You might be the only refugee from your family who makes it to shore.
Plucky
-
It is so hard not to want the very best for others. I do too. I really do. But when it comes to interpersonal relationships I have learned that with certain types of people I have only two choices -- keep trying to help them (and fail, plus tear myself down in the process) or get out. (Sometimes getting out cannot happen totally such as in your case, but in that case making some real distance -- emotionally if nothing else!)
I think it's taking on too much to try to save yourself, your mother and your brother all at the same time. You could all drown that way. You are not responsible for them as much as you think -- but we are ALL responsible for ourselves. Whether you make it through this is up to you (not your mother or brother); likewise for them, how they fare is up to THEM, not you.
There is a lot of misunderstanding about selfishness. Really there are two sides to that coin. One is very good and the other is stingy. It is so easy with the Christian thinking to think that selfishness is bad and stingy and sinful and wrong, and yes, it CAN be. But there is another kind of selfishness that is absolutely essential to emotional, spiritual, mental and physical health. Whoever said you cannot love others until you can first love yourself really had it right -- and whoever said Narcissists are into self-love had it wrong. If they really loved themselves they would not be narcissists and would indeed be able to love others! The narcissist is not in touch with his or her "core," but views himself or herself as a REFLECTION of what they think they need to see and what they can create through manipulation of others. Narcissism is NOT self-love. Narcissus did not fall in love with himself; he became mesmerized and "in love" with his REFLECTION. The reflection is so bogus that this is why the Narcissist does not feel responsibile for his or her own actions -- the reflection did it, and there is (obviously) a difference between who they really are and their reflection.
Obviously you are having some issues with totally accepting and loving yourself, and THIS is what you really need to worry about. If -- and that's a BIG if -- you could ever help either of them, it would only be AFTER you have achieved the very healthy and sane and GOOD goal of truly loving and accepting YOURSELF.
This one ex-preacher told me the difference between many Christians and some Atheists is that some Christians try to do the right thing just so they can go to heaven; whereas Atheists are more likely to do the right thing just because it seemed like the right thing to do. I thought that was a pretty good insight.
What I'm trying to say is, go ahead and work on getting it right just inside YOU, and then all the other stuff will fall into place. This is one way that my meditation practice has helped me very much --just getting in touch with my CORE, experiencing the love there, and naturally feeling a love for myself by the fact that I feel this love within myself.
Now maybe I got sidetracked and didn't finish everything I was trying to say, but anyhow, that's the main thing. Please Hoppy, worry about you first. Things are too overwhelming when we try to take on too much at once. Better to break it down into pieces what needs to be done. First piece, take care of precious, beautiful, caring, giving, human, lovable YOU.
Hugs!!!
pink
-
Thanks Plucky and Pink........
You're right.
It's all I can do to keep my own health right now. I can't make everything all right for both of them. They have their own suffering but you're right, their own responsibility.
Back to boundaries. Wearying stuff but at least NMom and I are peaceful again, for now.
5 weeks' countdown to job expiry...so I have a much more urgent task to do.
Thanks for the pep talk and your compassion. I hope by NEXT weekend I will be accomplishing things for my own life, rather than just revolving around hers.
Hopalong
-
((((((((Hoppy)))))))))
I don’t have much time… but wanted you to know I’m thinking of you. I really hope things have settled down for you, but I know you have the strength to get through this. I KNOW you will come out of the other side smiling.
Good luck on the job front…. Employers would be mad not to take you on board Hoppy….
Take care of YOU.
Hugs
H&H (your personal cheerleader!) xx
-
Hugs BACK, (((((((((H&H))))))))))!
Thanks a lot for your eternal kindness.
I'm sane, still fending her off to function but we're at peace. I apologized sincerely for blowing up (not for having the feelings) and she sincerely accepted. So...she still needs fending off (pounces for attention no matter what)...but we're at peace and there seems to be no punitive fallout anyway. She even said she hoped I would forgive my brother, which was more acknowledgement than she's ever volunteered. I said yes I do but prefer to do that work on my own in privacy. Changed the subject.
Same old boundary setting will always, always be necessary. But the crisis seems to have passed. And who knows, maybe in the long run it was worth it. She's been thanking me a lot for all I've done.
I feel as though I snatched my brain back from the jaws of a croc, so I'm tired!
But I'm okay.
ALL thanks to you and your wonderful kin here...
Hugs again,
Hopalong
-
hey, Hops, When I read this thread something keeps coming to mind. (for what it's worth)
It was something my mentor said about my husband's mother and his brother (and THAT is a spych nightmare) Anyway, what she said was: "they have an agreement".
What she meant was that the mother and the brother, energetically, have an agreement to do whatever little thing they do together, and although my husband may hear from his mother that "she loves him better and is just humoring the brother because of his mental illness" (like that's not the tip off to the weirdness) the truth is: they have their own little thing going on. And her advice to my husband: just do what you need to do and stop concerning yourself with getting approval from those two, because when they are together, nothing else matters but their "agreement". I think that's good stuff for everyone to remember.
So, when your mother asks you to "forgive" your brother....you might consider detaching (actually it seems that is what you did). Her relationship with him has nothing to do with you, or it shouldn't anyway.
-
Thank you! Mum, that's worth quite a bit.
That...vibrates.
I will think about that, next time I overhear them or see them interacting.
That helps a lot. I could stand outside it more and just see that they're doing their roles, in their own play.
Ahhhh. Feels peaceful to think about that.
I'd rather be in my own play!
:)
Hops