[CopperStar]

I'm really glad I'm set up on this Zyprexa prescription, it's helping me to stay sat back and contemplative. But I fell for a big piece of bait from my mother yet again.

So throughout this past winter, I was not on medication, kept telling my mother I need to see a pdoc (I am financially dependent on her after a period of homelessness), I wasn't showering hardly ever and was clearly not doing well. Yet my mother didn't seem concerned at all, and in fact trusted me to take care of her entire house for her for a week or longer at a time while she went off on vacations/cruises.

Now I am finally stable on medication and doing much better, and I have also been wanting a pet very badly, because I am hardwired to care and live for something or someone else, and I draw a lot of strength and comfort from that. And now she is taking the attitude that she is concerned about my mental health and doesn't know if she can trust me to look after a pet.

****ing seriously.

But then she threw the bait out, she said that if I can remain mentally stable for one month, then she will let me have a pet. And so the game was set and I took the bait. I agreed to her terms, however condescending they are. The game is that I have to passively, happily allow her to regard me as a retarded child, and constantly try to show her that I am not a retarded child, while she pretends like she gives half a damn about my mental well-being.

And in the end there is a very high chance that she will find some little flaw in me that proves that I am not really ready to have a pet, probably towards the finish line. Whenever she orchestrates this kind of game, it's not over until she wins, and she wins when I finally get upset and she can paint me as crazy.

I cannot ****ing believe I fell for this.

I am so sorry, Copper. I don't have any useful advice for you, except to say that, from my life experience (about 32 years of it), I just know that, no matter how close in relation a person may be to us, there is no guarantee that they will understand us, be able or willing to help us, or even just not hate us.

All human beings are infinitely complex, and, the older we get, the more emotional baggage and prejudices we carry. Our Moms and Dads have a lot of such baggage, no matter how well put together they may seem on the outside.

I'm not sure how old you are, but if life has taught me one thing, it's that independence is the first requisite to happiness. Living under someone else's roof is ALWAYS a problem ... whether it's parents, aunts n uncles, friends, whoever. If you wanna change your situation, you gotta make your own money, pay your own bills, and that's just the START OF IT !!!

Sorry I wasn't of much help, but I know what it feels like to have parents who get in the way of happiness.

[CopperStar]

I know you're right, and I am trying, but it feels hopeless. The best I can hope for is a call back from one of these local fast food or grocery store places, and then it will likely be part time and minimum wage, still not enough to get out on my own and support myself. I'm mostly just irritated that eve for a short while I actually let myself believe she wanted to do something nice for me like that, that there wouldn't be major strings attached or that it wouldn't wind up being one of her stupid power games. I should know better by now.

[Living Dead Guy]

Can you try to have a civil discussion were on paper you both write out what mentally stable means. Go into as many specifics as possible. Would silent treatment count, not going out and doing things with people, yelling, breaking things. Then post it somewhere in sight like on the fridge. Perhaps allowing for a warning every so often. Also try to determine the type of pet that is allowable, perhaps she would feel more comfortable with a caged pet like a hamster.

If this isn't possible, give it your best shot. Assuming things will end badly is something I do all the time and I'm more often incorrect then not.

If at the end of the month all of that fails then perhaps try volunteering at a pet shelter. If that's not possible make friends with a neighbor so you can co-own a pet. Growing up I walked the neighbors dogs for free and spent a great deal of time playing with them.

Best of luck.

[CopperStar]

I probably should have explained, sorry, but my mother is the reason I have BPD. She has always alternated between being very condescending, controlling and engulfing, and being very neglectful and self-absorbed, and being very sabotaging and spiteful.

I mean this is the mother who made me cry out of shame and fear when I tried to reach out for help as a little kid. She convinced CPS to back off our home, and then told me I was a liar and that if my dad went to jail it would be all my fault.

In some ways she is a monster, and everything seems to be a game to her. Trying to tell her how I feel and opening up to her just makes me that much more vulnerable, it is like putting blood in the water for a shark.

I think she is just ramping it up because I have started to do better lately with my new medication, and of course that's not okay. It's not okay for me to be doing better, becoming stable and gaining confidence.

So lately the game has been to try to undermine my confidence, be very condescending towards me and try to make me upset, as if she needs to prove to herself that I am still just her little mind****ed pet.

It's triggering some of my BPD traits, naturally, and that's exactly what she wants. She has never seemed to be able to handle it when I am doing well. I only deserve love and respect if I am a total trainwreck.

[marmaduke]

Your mother Copper, is a narcissist. Like mine.

[CopperStar]

Originally Posted by marmaduke

Your mother Copper, is a narcissist. Like mine.

She's something alright. I don't even feel like giving it a special label. She is controlling and manipulative and sometimes outright mean-spirited, but always in a very passive-aggressive way.

And she even brags about bull****ing and manipulating people behind their backs, I have heard that too many times to count. She calls herself "the master" of bull****ing, and constantly 'jokes' about how everything is all about her. She is boldly proud of what she is and feels no remorse. She has never come to me of her own accord to apologize for anything, not once in my entire life.

I have ceased caring about whether or not her mom was good to her, because my mother has not been very good to me for most of my life, and I don't use that as an excuse to mistreat others who are vulnerable. So I don't accept the excuse anymore. I am tired of holding myself to higher standards than I do to others with how they treat me. There is no excuse anymore.

[JadeAmethyst]

Dear CopperStar
I hear you. I wish you some peace and hope.

Jade

[marmaduke]

You sound worn out with it all. I understand Copper.
I found giving it a label helped me greatly, it explained sooo much. I'd always believed myself to be faulty. Now I know it was not me, never had been.
Mother ticked most of the boxes for NPD it was a revelation.

[CopperStar]

Originally Posted by marmaduke

You sound worn out with it all. I understand Copper.
I found giving it a label helped me greatly, it explained sooo much. I'd always believed myself to be faulty. Now I know it was not me, never had been.
Mother ticked most of the boxes for NPD it was a revelation.

The labels help to make sense of things. Researching BPD helped me understand my own self a little better years ago. Researching NPD (for my mother) and AsPD (for my father) helped me feel validated (which actually helped most of my BPD symptoms ease up quite a bit over the course of learning and putting the puzzle pieces together).

But my brain tends to work in a very systematic, structured way (or something, hard to articulate it). Like, I only accept one reality, and I process everything over and over until everything makes sense in that one reality.

So if the fact that I was abused while growing up, is not an excuse for me abuse others, and if I am able and willing to admit and work on my issues, then it means that my mother has had no excuse, and she could have admitted and worked on her issues, as well. But she chose not to do so.

That choice is what incites my rage towards her sometimes. It would be so different if she had ever come to me and said, "Hey, I am really sorry about when I did X, Y and Z really ****ed up things, that was wrong." Has never happened. AND the few times I've tried confronting her, she would manage to turn it around, somehow I was really the bad guy and I had to apologize to her for being angry with her. Just wtf lol.

[marmaduke]

Validation is very important.

These people are so frustrating.
I HATE my mother.
The stupid thing is if mother had said sorry, asked for forgiveness (and really meant it) I probably would have forgiven her.

Still, that was never going to happen,

[Seeker101]

Copper, I feel your pain, and I live it out frequently as well. My mother is probably undiagnosed BPD or NP. My dad is probably undiagnosed NP.

Regardless, my mom hates it when I'm in a support system and getting more and more leveled out and confident. She, also, does what she can to trigger me.

She is alternatingly condescending and then nice. It is maddening. I hear you.

To my advantage, she's chronically ill now, and doesn't seem to have the energy, or wits about her, to inflict the damage she has in years past.

[CopperStar]

This is a pretty good read, I think, for people with BPD who have a PD mother:

How Mothers "Spread" Borderline Personality Disorder to Children/ Show Me a Patient with BPD and I Will Show You a Patient Whose Mother Had BPD | Carlsbad, CA Patch