For people who have distanced themselves from family members...

[Anonymous]

How have you dealt with feelings of regret? Especially as it pertains to children?

I saw several threads today on estrangement today and thought it was very close to something I have been dealing with.

My mother is a BPD nightmare, alcoholic / pain killer demon, and her insanity has cost me and my three girls several relationships with extended family members. The extended family members basically feel uncomfortable having a closer relationship with us than my mother does, and refuse to admit she has a problem despite decades of hospitalizations and tons of issues. They all grew up with some kind of abuse, and are in times of stress, verbally and emotionally abusive.

I want to protect my children from her, but I wasn't planning on having them not know anyone in my family, and am feeling guilty. At the end of the day, I would prefer living with that guilt than exposing them to the extended family's weird dynamics, but I am really having trouble coping with this reality.... which makes me essentially an orphan.

Advice?

[Anonymous]

I am sorry, OP. I have thought about cutting off my relationships with parents and family members, and they sounds much less destructive than yours. What has held me back is (1) setting an example to my kids to maintain relationships, even though not ideal, and (2) that my family, though extremely hurtful, still occasionally brings things to the table and helps me out in a pinch (but only in emergencies).

So one thing to ask yourself is what would set the best example for your kids. Maintaining unhealthy relationships? Or completely cutting people out? Neither is ideal, but such is life.

[Anonymous]

OP here. Yes, it is a tricky situation, but the severity of my mother's problems make it feel like a no-brainer. As I have distanced our family from her (and she has done plenty of that herself as well) my other family members have cut us off.

My mother is a serious abuser. She has a grudge against my eldest, who at 3 didn't respond "respectfully" to her - and she is now 6. (My child is shy and had a shy moment) I have seen her throw her dogs against the wall, hard, when they don't "listen" to her. Luckily, growing up, we had no physical abuse, but very serious emotional and verbal abuse.

I have fought a very hard path out of the cloud I grew up in, and don't want to expose my children to those patterns. I don't want them to know what I have had to work so hard to break free of. Somehow I was blessed with a slightly stronger constitution than my sister. My sister is really messed up from it, completely cowed and defeated as a person, has trouble maintaining friendships, love relationships, jobs. She has horrible self-esteem / non-existent self worth, and can never manage to really advocate for herself. I don't like to hang out with her for long periods because that gets to me as well, hearing her stories of how she continues to let these patterns evolve into her life, even while she has a therapist.

I managed to fight through, not without scars, and not without some remnants. But I have a successful, demanding career, a great husband, and three incredible children. Financially we are stable but not what I would call successful. Master's degree in a technical field. Am I at the very top of my field, no. But I am talented and valued. We have a decent house and a hopefully bright future. My mother hates me for getting out, and for having this family life. She belittles me and find ways to sabotage relationships at any visit we do, with any person, so we keep a limit on it. We do short 30 minute visits twice a year max.

However, to up the ante, as she always will, my mother has manipulated her siblings to a point, and they have legitimately chosen of their own accord, to cut us out of their lives. There were one or two relationships where we were legitimately close and had what I thought was a healthy relationship. It made me so happy that my children had those relationships. However, in times of stress, I did see some unhealthy, abusive screaming and manipulative demands emerge with them, namely, that I wasn't dropping everything to be by my mother's side during a heart surgery (damage caused by painkillers, which destroy heart valves) literally giving notice at my job and spending three months with her, then, around Christmas, that I did not respond to a gift "fast enough" (4 days before Christmas, sorry! Busy time with three kids!) and finally, that I was not "respectful" enough by suggesting that we have a somewhat spontaneous visit with three days notice instead of a month. Those are their choices to be offended in those situations, and I believe they sort of masked the true issue, that they were convenient excuses for the fact that they were choosing my mother (out of pity which she still manages to elicit from them) over me and my young family.

This is a typical game of my mother's and one she plays with many people over the course of her sad life. My reaction has been, "well, if they do not want to be part of my children's childhood, that is their choice." It is hard for me that they will not acknowledge my mother's abusive behavior or multiple drug addictions. I just wonder how this plays out down the road. It pains me but as mentioned earlier, I do not feel that I actually have a choice here.

[Anonymous]

In your case, it seems far safer and healthier to remain "estranged." Give up the fantasy of an extended family for your kids because they and you deserve better and dealing with flaky, extended family members who defend your mom is still dysfunctional.

Focus the same kind of energy that you have used to build a good life with your own family and career on creating a family of friends.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
In your case, it seems far safer and healthier to remain "estranged." Give up the fantasy of an extended family for your kids because they and you deserve better and dealing with flaky, extended family members who defend your mom is still dysfunctional.

Focus the same kind of energy that you have used to build a good life with your own family and career on creating a family of friends.

Thank you so much. It is hard to imagine my little ones growing up without any connection to my family, and I am embarrassed by that. But I can't let that overpower the truth in what you've just said. Sometimes, it is just hard to believe that any of this is real. But I think that common denial is what can give so many abusers repeat access to those around them.

[Anonymous]

OP, you have 2 chances to have a healthy, happy family - one is the family you are born into, the other is the family you create.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
In your case, it seems far safer and healthier to remain "estranged." Give up the fantasy of an extended family for your kids because they and you deserve better and dealing with flaky, extended family members who defend your mom is still dysfunctional.

Focus the same kind of energy that you have used to build a good life with your own family and career on creating a family of friends.

Very sound advice, PP. My family of origin is highly dysfunctional. While it was hard to give up the fantasy of a supportive and loving extended family, I just had to. Emotional, psychological, and physical abuse, is no longer an option, for me, in relationships. OP, you can build a good life for your children and self with a family of friends. You will have to grieve your dysfunctional family first and then get on with it.

[Anonymous]

OP: I have a similar situation. I blocked my mothers phone numbers and emails. At first it was tough, but it has been delightful not having her toxins in my life. We all have choices in life. Your mother has made her choices and you are free to do the same.

[Anonymous]

OP, when you are assigned a role in the family, it is tough to break out of it. Perhaps your role was "take care of mom" and instead you had three kids. Or your role could be "goat" and you did not love taking the blame for everything. I did not say that these roles were fair of not self serving by your sibs.

[Anonymous]

I "escaped" my parents and came to this continent. No close family around. Now that I'm far away, I'm on good terms with my parents and other family members in my home country - because I hardly ever see them.

So I'm very happy. My kids will not grow up with a family network, but at least they're not subjected to verbal abuse, a twisted body image and guilt-tripped expectations.

It's great when you limit contact, OP. It gives you the space to appreciate from afar any good points your family may have, without being exposed to their bad points.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
In your case, it seems far safer and healthier to remain "estranged." Give up the fantasy of an extended family for your kids because they and you deserve better and dealing with flaky, extended family members who defend your mom is still dysfunctional.

Focus the same kind of energy that you have used to build a good life with your own family and career on creating a family of friends.

Very sound advice, PP. My family of origin is highly dysfunctional. While it was hard to give up the fantasy of a supportive and loving extended family, I just had to. Emotional, psychological, and physical abuse, is no longer an option, for me, in relationships. OP, you can build a good life for your children and self with a family of friends. You will have to grieve your dysfunctional family first and then get on with it.

+1

OP, your birth family is not your fault. You did not choose that situation.

You did, however, choose to take control of your own life and move forward, with damn good reason. You realized early that your mother's life was/is not the life for you, nor will it ever be. It is going to be fine. You just need to remember why you left.

She will never be the mother you want her to be, and it has absolutely nothing to do with you. She has her own baggage that she will never address. Not your problem, and definitely not your children's problem.

My mom is similar to yours. She tries to dissolve and/or sabotage every relationship I am in by embarrassing me with lies. People are smarter than you think. They do not believe her version. They never will. They see the truth, easily. She may try to convince you otherwise, but it will never be her call. Ever.

You need to enjoy what you worked so hard for. You are not alone.

[Anonymous]

I have 2 children. I grew up with a brother and sister.

The sister always has drama, always about her, I can't handle it. Luckily she is far away and we don't visit so the problem is easy. She will call and I can talk for 5 mins but really can[t take the complaining or preaching much longer.

My brother lives closer but picks on my kids. Says mean snarkly things about not listening, not doing good in school, having problems, He will scream at his kids. After one sleep over, all the nieces and nephews said they were afraid and would never go back again. He is always picking on my son, and both my daughter and son comment on this and neither will visit. I did not even try to talk to him about it, I just stopped going over or responding to phone calls.

I wish we were closer. I wish they were not so difficult and painful to be around. I have gotten to the point in life where I just don't have the energy to deal with these emotions and pain.

My brother has 2 kids that are very nice, I wish I was part of their life but itis just weird when we get together and never comfortable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
I "escaped" my parents and came to this continent. No close family around. Now that I'm far away, I'm on good terms with my parents and other family members in my home country - because I hardly ever see them.

So I'm very happy. My kids will not grow up with a family network, but at least they're not subjected to verbal abuse, a twisted body image and guilt-tripped expectations.

It's great when you limit contact, OP. It gives you the space to appreciate from afar any good points your family may have, without being exposed to their bad points.

This is the approach I have taken. Skype, text, occasionally phone calls. Very little in person interaction.

Accompanied by a lot of hard work and grieving with the help of a therapist.

Also, OP, as I am sure you know, these kinds of relationships are inherently unstable, so just because your other extended family members are distant now does not mean it will always be that way. In my family, I've gone years without speaking to certain people and then have rekindled the relationships. You have the power to decide if you would ever want to do that.

I am so sorry you're going through this. We spend our holidays and social occasions alone as a family of four, and sometimes it is crushingly sad. You have a right to feel sad.

[Anonymous]

OP, we have distanced ourselves from my husband's side of the family, which is highly dysfunctional--his father is estranged from the family, as is his sister, and his mother is a controlling, passive aggressive, horrible person, and he has little relationship with his brother. His mother hasn't spoken to his sister in 15 years for siding with her ex-husband in the divorce, and the divorce really divided the family, so his brother is estranged from his father, and his sister is estranged from his mother. It's incredibly dysfunctional. We see his mother and brother once a year and his father once a decade.

My family is small--just my parents, who live on the West Coast so we only see them once a year. I have lots of extended family who have zero interest in a relationship with me. We have no local family--closest kin is in the midwest.

Anyhow, I really struggle with accepting that we don't have a large, loving family and that my son won't grow up with loving grandparents/aunts/uncles and cousins around (my son won't have any cousins as my husband's siblings don't have kids). My FIL has no interest in meeting our son, his only grandchild.

I really envy people who grew up here and have these large loving families who they get together with for holidays, events and milestones, and who are supportive. Whereas we have no one, except my parents who are thousands of miles away (they retired to the West Coast by choice), and we spend every holiday alone and it is so depressing to me.

To the poster who recommended creating a new family of friends, is that really realistic? I have been trying to do that with and it has been hard and not very successful. We have been in the area for 5 years and moved here from the midwest, and we did not know anyone when we moved here. We are in the suburbs, and most people we meet are from this area and have very strong family ties and social circles already, and are too "crazy busy" to get together much, if at all. I have joined mom's groups and invite other moms to do things a lot, and attend events, and still haven't been able to make many friends, and certainly no friends who are like family. I invite people to do things and they don't respond or say they are too busy, and we are never invited to do things. The people I meet all spend weekends and holidays with their own extended family. So it is hard. I feel very alone here in an extistential sense.

Has anyone been successful at making friends who are like family? If so, how did you do it?

[Anonymous]

I think the only regret you would feel is regret that things couldn't be different, not regret that you did anything wrong. Not only should you make this choice because it benefits you, I feel you have the obligation to protect your children from this highly unstable and potentially dangerous woman. Just knowing that someone abuses animals would be enough for me.

I wish you peace, OP. You absolutely deserve it. Remember the first three rules of dealing with BPD: boundaries, boundaries, boundaries. The relationship needs to be 100% on your terms.

Best of luck to you!