To: Carol

[Guest guest]

I am beginning to realise that being a KO is a life time of fixing

what our nadas created. Everyone gets there at their own speed, but

I look at me even six months ago and think I never realised how bad

I treated myself or the crap I allowed other to throw on me. SCARY!

It may have been a long time coming for you with this husband, but

you deserve to be happy. I know it feels sometime that because of

nada, I've been robbed of alot of happiness and what might have

been. Then I say to myself, at the moment I woke up from hell, no

one said it was easy, no one promised me heaven, so I have to make a

happy life for me and I will lose so many along the way. It is hard.

I wish you luck. Life is too short to waste time on " evil " people.

You woke up from hell. Now give yourself the happy life your more

than deserve. Yesterday I was feeling kinda odd, hard to explain. I

looked at all the ones I have lost, some relatives, some chilhood

friends and others. I thought it is so sad it has to be this way. I

have a few GOOD people in my life and I thank God for sending them,

they are wonderful. It is just sad sometimes how much is lost.

I think all we have to do is continue to get healthy and have good

boundries and MOST will fall away. They can't get what they need

from us. We become of no use and they just fade away. How can it be

as if we never existed to them at all? It is like we never mattered.

I guess we never really did to those people.

>

> Thanks Kerri, MJ and , and all others who are holding their

breath on

> this topic ...

>

> This is a vent ... big time. Thanks for your indulgence.

>

> Yup, after nearly 30 years of marriage ... faithful, if I need to

state that

> ... 'I' have come down with an STD. Need I say more?

>

> And yes, I am really mad.

>

> It is with extreme remorse/shame/self-incrimination that I admit

to myself

> of late that I've been in denial for nearly 30 years. My husband

of 27 years

> is a male version of my BP mother; completely oblivious to the

harm he does

> in projecting the facade of 'perfection', while pursuing his own

needs. It

> has come to the 'how more stupid could I be' phase of my life.

All the 'red

> flags' were there; I chose to make excuses for the behaviors that

I knew in my

> heart were BP. So, here I am.

>

> The first clue that I overlooked was that he completely ignored

me from the

> day that we returned home from the beach honeymoon...for an

entire week. My

> sofa was in the neighbor's house ... and he made repeated excuses

for not

> bringing it back...tennis, pizza, miniature golf, 'quality time'

with his

> kids...not my 8 year old son. Goal: make the 'real' children

feel important...more

> important than the 'new/second wife'.

>

> Clue # 2: the ex-wife syndrome. She actually invaded our home

while we were

> away for a weekend, went through our personal belongings ... found

our newly

> minted wills/and CALLED HIM in a rage about NOT being executor of

OUR

> estates! SHE was the mother of HIS children after all. I backed

down on

> prosecuting her for burglary. OMG, how vulgar that seems to me

today.

>

> Clue # 3: The stepchildren. On the weekend of our first

anniversary he

> arranged, without my knowledge, to baby-sit his children ... not

his weekend.

> Our prearranged weekend was canceled without notice; and I was

left feeling

> guilty and selfish for NOT thinking of 'the children' first.

>

> FAST FORWARD a decade: He required that I 'contribute' 1/2 of the

cost of a

> new roof on our house, so I took funds out of my enuity ... the

only independe

> nt resource I had ... to match his 'contribution' to 'the house.'

>

> I discovered later that he had lost 1/4 of a million $ on CORN

futures; he

> demanded that I contribute half of the margin call, I did. OH My

GOD ... how

> stupid/dependent/needy was I.

>

> History: This is my second marriage. My first marriage, in my

early 20s,

> lasted only 4 years; he was the 'clone' of my dishrag,

submissive, alcoholic

> father. As mild mannered as he was I came to detest his

weaknesses ... low

> self esteem, mothering-needyness, and a loathsome habit of losing

jobs due to

> drunkenness.

>

> I Aced psych 101; and pursued a degree in psych until I realized

that I

> actually loath needy people ... how funny is that? I've been the

neediest person

> I know. And have exited all these years.

>

> Carol

>

>

>

>

>

>

>

[Guest guest]

I don't know who I'm writing to here - I just signed up last night out of

sheer frustration with my mother who I've just learned has BPD. she is 80 years

old and I've been dealing with this since my dad died almost 29 years ago.

I've wanted to put a " name " to her condition for many years - even thought she

was getting Alzheimers but she's as smart as a tack and pretty much remembers

everything. A friend recognized the symptoms of BPD and sent me a book about

it and I was amazed at how the symptoms matched up. I know she's had this all

her life but she was not this bad when my dad was alive. I was married for 1

year when he died and since we had no ties to a home or anything we moved in

with her to support her emotionally for awhile. What I thought would be a year

turned into 5. I felt too guilty to move out. All 3 of my children were

born while we were living with her. After we moved she sold her house and moved

into a mobile home park but wasn't happy and blamed her move on her other son

in law - she felt he pushed her to sell. My husband and I were in rentals for

the next 11 years. We always insluded mom in whatever activites we did - and

she was pleasant to be around for the most part. Once in awhile a crisis

would arise and she would go over the edge but it didn't happen too often. The

only real symptom I saw at that time (looking back) of BPD was her constant

phone calls to me every day - 7 - 8 - 10 times a day she'd call and then every

once in awhile I wouldn't hear from her. I'd call and she would be mad because

she was testing me to see if I'd call her. In 1993 we approached her to see

if she might be willing to buy a home with us. We wanted to stop renting but

couldn't afford a down payment - she was lonely - we thought she'd enjoy being

closer to the kids - so we bought a house with a downstairs unit for her. The

last 13 years have been pure hell. It's like a monster was released. She

hates our laid back life style - she'd be happy if we worked all the time - she

took a great relationship with my 3 kids and drove 2 of them away. My oldest

son lives about a mile away and doesn't like to come over - my daughter just

moved 1700 miles away to Texas (we live in California). All she does is rage -

she's angry all the time. She wont' allow me any personal time - I have to

come right home after work - can't go anywhere without her. She's not going to

change at 80 years old. I can't even get her to go to a regular doctor so I

know she'd never go into any therapy. Any type of mental illness would be

looked down upon in her family and she'd never admit that anything was her

fault.

I'm sure this is typical of most people's lives on this site. I'm just not

sure how to get started and wanted to lay out my life and what I'm going thru.

I signed up after pure desperation last night. My daughter has just moved

and I'm looking at my life now stretching out before me with just me and her -

my husband and youngest son are here but I'm the one she borderlines at and she

wants my attention on her and not them. So it's me and her.

I have a sister who lives about 30 miles away but she doesn't see that

there's a problem and the times I've practically begged for her to help out she

won't.

L